Green City In The Sun

Photo Courtesy of Africa Knows - www.africaknows.com

Well over 100 years ago, a patch of marshland about half way between the planned East African Railway between the seaside town of Mombasa and Kampala, Uganda was a place referred to as ‘Enkare Nyorobi’  by Maasai herdsmen. It simply meant a ‘place of cool waters’ and was an area they frequently visited to water and graze their cattle. It provided an ideal resting place for the railway engineers and workers building the Lunatic Express to recoup and reenergise.

Nairobi soon became a major commercial and administrative centre and later grew into Kenya’s capital city. The pleasant climate and green leafy neighbourhoods surrounded by virgin plains of savannah gave it the name ‘Green City In The Sun’. In the early post independence times, Nairobi was the envy of most of Africa and the developing world as it rose to prominence and held lots of promise. Somewhere along the line this promise faded and the city wallowed its way amongst the challenges of the times.

Today though, the promise of a shining city beams clearly from the not too distant sky. Although wounded from previous battles and growing pains, a 21^st century Nairobi is in the works.  Everything from really smart people, technology and urban infrastructure is being rejuvenated. Very few cities in the world have access to efficient, affordable and effective world class mobile communication facilities that converge everything from commerce, to voice and data communication.

You could say that Nairobi today is a petri-dish of ‘Development 2.0;’ a new paradigm that seeks to inculcate inward oriented sustainable development. Success stories such as Safaricom and Equity Bank have defied many development theories and theorists. This year’s theme; ‘Green City In The Sun’ seeks to inspire Nairobi’s thinkers and doers to jump on to the ‘Green’ mantra and work towards building a city of ‘Green’ excellence on all fronts from technology, science, social science, art and design.

So what exactly is ‘Green’? Well, it is a term that has heavy connotations to environmental activism and politics. We at TEDxNairobi view it from a more macroscopic perspective, whereby we seek to enthuse a culture that is environmentally friendly and to chart out positive development of clean technology and innovation that will sustain ecosystems and economies for many generations to come.

The hullaballoo of Nairobi’s development comes at a pivotal time in world history. Upstream innovation from the developing to the developed world is now being accepted as a norm and there is also high diffusion of cutting edge technology to the developing world as can be seen with mobile communication technology which furthermore lead various innovative business models and services. One does not have to venture far to realise that the ‘Green’ bug has hit town, walk past Parliament Way and you will see solar powered street lamps, on a clear day look towards Ngong Hills and you will see a couple of windmills, Safaricom also has some its base stations running on green energy and the Turkana Wind Farm project is poised to be sub-Saharan Africa’s largest wind farm in terms of capacity.

Kenya certainly has its own challenges but also has a unique opportunity to leap frog and emerge as a leader both in industrial and micro innovation of the ‘Green’ economy. This year’s event is certainly worth attending and will without doubt bring together  Nairobi’s leading minds who will definitely craft and co-operate in creating a sustainable, prosperous and promising ‘Green’ future for Africa’s one and only ‘Green City In The Sun.’

Registration is now open and places are limited, so blank out the afternoon of September 18^th 2010 on your diary and book a place right away to avoid disappointment.