2020 will be a global forum where Africa can share its plans and achievements, seek investments and solutions to its challenges, forge new relationships across the continent and across the globe, and continue its shift from donor-dependency to productive partnerships. For the first time in the 170-year history of World Expos, every African nation will participate, each with its own pavilion, while the African Union will also host its own pavilion at Expo 2020 – a colourful arena devoid of national borders that will showcase Africa’s vast potential and ambitions, reflected in its Agenda 2063 aspirations, which address agriculture, transport, science and technology, and health. Visitors will taste Ethiopia’s next big super-grain, discover how croton nuts create energy in Kenya, explore Gabon’s space ambitions and more, and Expo is already supporting many grass-roots innovations via its Expo Live initiative and Global Best Practice Programme. These include a tele-medicine platform that screens and diagnoses women in rural Cameroon for breast and cervical cancers; and a social enterprise in Rwanda that is improving the lives of female coffee farmers and their families through barista training and the promotion of local coffee consumption.
SOURCE: THE AFRICA REPORT