Month: March 2018

Wangari Maathai: the African woman Nobel Prize Winner

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The African Chamber of Commerce is celebrating the International Woman Day commemorating African women who changed the world we live in a better place.

This year we are united to honour Dr. Wangari Maathai who became the first African woman to win the Nobel Prize for her work demonstrating the intricate links between the environment, democracy and peace through Kenya’s Green Belt Movement.

As many girls in Kenya, the young Wangari was taught to respect nature. She grew up loving the lands, plants, and animals that surrounded her from the giant mugumo trees to the tiny tadpoles that swam in the river. Although most Kenyan girls were not educated, Wangari, curious and hardworking, was allowed to go to school. She excelled at science and went on to study in the United States. After returning home Dr. Maathai used with devotion her knowledge and compassion to promote the rights of the Kenyan women and to help save the land and the trees of her country. In 1997 Dr. Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement, an environmental non-governmental organization focused on the planting of trees, environmental conservation, and women’s rights and since its foundation an estimated 45 million trees were planted around Kenya.

What made the Green Belt Movement remarkable was that it was also conceived as a source of employment in rural areas, and mostly a way to empower women who in their ordinary daily life they normally came second to men in terms of power, education and much else because of the cultural and social structure of many African countries.

Dr. Maathai was awarded in 2004 of the Nobel Peace Prize  that  for the the first time it had gone to an African woman. She was an elected member of Parliament and served as assistant minister for Environment and Natural resources in the government of President Mwai Kibaki between January 2003 and November 2005. Unfortunately, in 2011 Maathai died of complications from ovarian cancer.

Boosting women’s potential as “green agents of change” is necessary to realize the full potential of investments in conservation in African countries and around the world.  Today we all stand together in memory of Maathai.

 

 

YOUTH EMPOWERMENT SEMINAR

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Among the main objectives of the African chamber of Commerce is to give youths the opportunity to develop and empower their skills in order to reveal their full potentials to become valuable members for the development of their communities.

On the 1st of March 2018, we organized a Youth Empowerment Seminar in Mixpace Wonderwall gathering students, young entrepreneurs and experts of the fields of Chinese education and entrepreneurialism.

Mr. Pablo Venegas, Partnership Director of China Campus Network opened the seminar with a presentation of CCN mission and study programs which aims are improving the enrollment quality of international students and develop global
talents to create bridges between China and their home countries. A significant question raised by Mr. Vengas to the audience was “Why China?”.

He explained that China nowadays is taking center stage in the global economy and that initiatives like One Belt One Road are bringing massive investment in many key sectors adding that Chinese companies are following the same path towards internationalization at an accelerated pace. This means that there will be a high demand of highly skilled and competitive talents that need to be addressed and trained to achieve their high potential.

Mr. D. Nkwetato Tamonkia, current chairperson of AFCHAM, after providing a general outline of African Chamber of Commerce vision and mission he presented the different problems faced by the international students during their experience in China, from the cultural shock, language barrier and nostalgia to the moment they need to renew the Visa from “X” to “Z” and setting up a business or building a family in China. There are different challenges and implication youth have to face during their experience abroad far from their families but Mr. Tamonkia conclude with a wise citation of Wayner Dayer “Everything you are against weakens you. Everything you are for empowers you”.

Also for Mr. Simon Brantes, specialized in importing and exporting business, China is the right country to be for ambitious young entrepreneurs. In less than a decade China has emerged as the world leader in e-commerce with Alibaba Group, E-lema and other retail e-commerce platforms. A way to empower youths and making them active part of the Chinese economic growth is to provide them a training program on e-commerce as this is regarded the future driving force in different fields of the Chinese economy.

A panel discussion was open between the hosts and the audience and a variety of topics were raised on the challenges to face while starting a business in China, implications of the scholarships during a study programs in China, the importance of being flexible and having always a Chinese partner while starting a career in the country and the skills and knowledge we can gain from our Chinese experience that then we can provide to our country of origins. The panel discussion was then followed by a refreshing break and general networking. The seminar ended with the assignment of the Certificates of Youth Empowerment for the attendees that have actively took part of the seminar. We firmly believe that through these seminars and the AYEP program with highly-qualified experts we create the basis for a better community in which youths which represent the growth and prosperity of a society are empowered.