Thursday 13 March 2014

How we tell our stories in Africa

                     
We have big problems and massive challenges in Africa but we need to re-package that 'African story' to read huge opportunities.

We cannot portray small holder farmers as poor people and expect more people to take up agriculture. Young people won't #Doagric with that 'poor for the unemployed in the village' association.

We have sanitation issues and waste management problems but we still talk of them 'garbage challenges' and dirt. Let's tell the stories of those recycling and showcase their products. Maybe even have policy in place to give incentives to those doing it and adopt + promote their products as customers.

We cannot have more B corporations if the consumer is not conscious enough to ask where the product/s is manufactured and how the raw materials are sourced. Because we glorify the good numbers + profits and huge turnovers not stories on values, ethics and quality work/products.

We need a more technical workforce yet we think of polytechnics as places for failures and blue collar jobs as juakali.

We think of the upcountry as 'mashinani & ocha' and the city + towns as 'places of great opportunity' then push guys to go back explore opportunities in the village.

The society views entrepreneurship as an “exit plan” or a "last resort" when there are no jobs, Instead, of preparing + encouraging + supporting+ mentoring+ investing in young people from an early age to think of entrepreneurship as a viable career option then tell & re-tell their stories.

We want to tell the world on Twitter whenever shit happens in Kenya but we don't want to #tag and trend the good stuff happening locally.

And the result is a mzungu lands in JKIA straight to a conference on Africa, tells the 'African story' better than us and raises more money to go fix our small holder agric problems deep in Bungoma.

We need and must change how we package, tell and share these stories. 

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