Rwanda will on Sunday host the launch of the knowledge-based product known as Kusi Ideas Festival, an annual international ideas conference which will be held in Kigali.
Organisers say that the festival which will be the first of its kind, will be held on Sunday and Monday will bring together some of the most free-spirited and bold people calling out Africa’s challenges, and those turning them into opportunities.
For the next 60 years in Africa, it is noted, these will be the people shaping the continent.
The festival allows connections to this valuable cast of players and gives institutions and businesses a great opportunity to hitch their wagon to the coming African Century.
"The City of Kigali is happy to be a venue for this innovative festival (KUSI ideas Festival) as a city we not only strive to be a venue the promotion of MICE but also be at the centre of the birth of ground-breaking innovations and ideas,” the City of Kigali Mayor, PudenceRubingisa said
After the launch in Kigali, the Kusi ideas festival will be held in different African cities annually in the years to come. The name Kusi is coined from one of a regular pattern of the monsoon winds in the Indian Ocean which allowed for traders to plan their trade routes south and north along the East African coast.
The Kusi (southerly) wind, a mainly southerly wind blowing for approximately six months from April to mid-September, allowed traders to head up north along the coast.
It is noted that beyond trade, over the centuries, Kusi and other trade winds made possible cultural, intellectual, and technological exchanges, and considerably shaped the history of the nations on the east side of Africa, its hinterland, and the wider Indian Ocean rim.
By 2025, it is forecast that the continent’s population will rise to 2.4 billion and will continue to grow to 4.2 billion, nearly 4 times its present size in the next 100 years, bringing its share of the global population from 17 per cent at present to 40 per cent.
At the same time, Africa will have three megacities comprised of more than 10 million people each with Lagos, Nigeria projected to be the largest city on earth by 2075.
Over 50 per cent of Africans are under the age of 20, compared to the global median age of 30.
Organisers of the festival observe that the world’s future, in that sense is very African, and it is a future that’s both exciting and frightening – providing a precious platform to create and sell solutions and build immense wealth, "but also very punishing if we fail.”