Whether you’re religious about your coffee or just a casual drinker, you’ve no doubt seen mention of Ethiopian coffee on some sort of packaging or marketing. Well beginning this month the brand identity and marketing of Ethiopian coffee will finally be regulated and controlled by the Ethiopian government. After a long fight with coffee giant Starbucks, in early 2007 the Ethiopian government won the the rights to trademark it’s coffee beans which account for about 2% of Starbucks’ coffee purchase. In a effort to use Starbucks as leverage and re-position the country Ethiopia within the luxury lifestyle so many of us attempt to live out by drinking our premium coffee, the Ethiopian government recently hired UK-based design firm Brandhouse to create a series of new brand logos to use in it’s upcoming coffee marketing push. The new logo featuring a letter “E” in the form of a coffee bean over the name of the countries most popular coffee varieties Harar, Yirgacheffe or Sidamo, accompanied by the slogan “Ethiopian Fine Coffee.”, was designed to “establish Ethiopia’s reputation for high-quality coffee around the
world, like French wine, Russian caviar, or Cuban cigars.” No doubt the Ethiopian government have realised how their country’s natural resource is a coveted commodity around the world and is using Starbucks’ marketing techniques to try to get a larger share of the revenues from their number 1 export. Hopefully the marketing plan for Ethiopian coffee tells the story of how Ethiopia has long been considered the birthplace of coffee. Stories sell products and brands, and if done well a story from the originator of coffee should sell foreigners on the image of a bountiful, resource-rich Ethiopia, a stark contrast to the current story of Ethiopia resounding in tourist and consumer minds.
Annansi Notes: Fall Out Boy, Mandela, Clint Eastwood, African babies, Facebook in Kenya
- Fall Out Boy head to Africa….Uganda really (What’s a rock band’s image without an African charity connection. Shout out to director extraordinaire Alan Ferguson) )
- Clint Eastwood will direct Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon in a new Nelson Mandela movie “The Human Factor” (The Hollywood/Africa trend grows. They should expect a call from some concerned Africans real soon.)
- Facebook is the new office fashion in Kenya (Rupert Murdoch needs to get the Myspace/Wall Street Journal thing sorted out fast)
- Actress Mary-Louise Parker adopts a child from Africa (Can all these African childrens’ biological families get visitation visas now?)
Video: Journalist Andrew Mwenda on the dark side of African aid
UNICEF: Mudfaced African children need your help!
If there was any doubt about how ineffective and out of touch old-world charity organizations have become when it comes to Africa(ns), here is an example. UNICEF Germany put time, effort and valuable resources into producing this recent ad campaign which “shows four German kids who appeal for solidarity with their contemporaries in Afrika”. In an attempt at drawing a familiarity between German and African children on the topic of education Jung von Matt/Alster – UNICEF’s ad agency – came up with the brilliant idea of showing typical German children with mud spread across their faces. Taglines for the ads include: “In Africa, many kids would be glad to worry about school”, “Some teachers suck. No teachers sucks even more”, “In Africa, kids don’t come to school late, but not at all”, and my personal favorite “I’m waiting for my last day in school, the children in Africa are still waiting for their first one”.
Needless to say, the ads have caused a lot of controversy. When “help” efforts like UNICEF’s and the eerily similar Giorgio Armani’s Kate Moss cover are so off mark, you know there is a serious need for African intervention at the planning stages. Someone tell these guys to give me a call before they embarrass themselves further and continue to lose money.
More coverage:
- Sokari and other Africans give comments
- Jennifer Brea breaks it down on The Guardian’s blog
- RADAR Magazine mocks the campaign
- Media Bistro asks WTF??!!
- alena Amusa tries to educate UNICEF
- UNICEF apologizes??? (not really).
Forget aid and money, Africa needs IDEAS!
If ideas are capital, why is Africa investing more on things than on information, and more on the military than on education? Suddenly, I realized what this idea could mean for Africa. If the pen is mightier than the sword, why does a general earn more than the work of a hundred writers combined? If ideas are indeed capital, then Africa should stem its brain drain and promote the African Renaissance, which will lead to the rebirth of the continent. After all, a renaissance is a rebirth of ideas. And knowledge and ideas are the engines that drive economic growth.
From Philip Emeagwali’s speech delivered at the University of Alberta, Canada, September 23, 2006 (read more)
“Africa:The Next Chapter” videos premiere
The good folks at TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) have debuted the first videos from the powerful TEDGlobal 2007 conference held in Tanzania earlier this year. Called “Africa: The Next Chapter”, the conference featured talks from many of Africa’s current innovators. The first few uploaded videos include South African investment banker Euvin Nadoo – who I met at the Harvard Club in New York in April – describing a continent poised to light up, Ghanaian economist George Ayittey’s lacerating criticism of Africa’s “hippo generation” to inspiring appeal for the “cheetah generation” to arise, former Finance Minister of Nigeria Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala showing how the different pieces of the aid vs trade argument could be reconciled, and finally 19-year-old Malawian inventor William Kamkwamba who won a standing ovation for his shy 3-minute interview, revealing how as a 14-year-old he solved his parents’ energy needs in a village which had no electricity. These first videos are a window into the minds of Africa’s growing entrepreneural class. I can’t wait for the other speakers’ videos.
Starchitect David Adjaye brings his building art to America
YG points to a new exhibit by UK-based Ghanaian star architect David Adjaye opening today at the Studio Museum of Harlem in New York City. The exhibit, Making Public Buildings, introduces Adjaye’s architecture to American audiences by carrying viewers through his working process-from inspiration to completion-through ten projects, both built and uncompleted. Having been awarded an Order of the British Empire by the queen for services to architecture, following several public works including his Idea Stores, which have shaken up the notion of the library, and his Nobel Peace Center in Oslo, Mr. Adjaye is set to take on America. With both a New York office for his company Adjaye/Associates and his Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver opening this fall the star architect has his American debut all lined up. About his current work Mr. Adjaye tells New York Magazine:
We are building a house for an amazing art collector [Adam Lindemann and his wife, gallerist Amalia Dayan] on the Upper East Side. It is quite hermetic. In ten years, 50 percent of the world will live in cities; they are becoming massive. The home is something that becomes an emotional incubator and resuscitator. It is not about tricks but about the way in which you reorient a person’s perceptions by focusing on water or on a tree or on a texture of a wall, making the home a meditative space. For this house, the thing the house reflects on will also be art.
David Adjaye’s Making Public Buildings opens today, July 18, 2007, with a 7pm reception at the Studio Museum of Harlem. The exhibition continues through Sunday, October 28, 2007 (Wed-Fri: 12-6pm / Sat: 10am-6pm / Sun: 12-6pm).
Careers in Africa Recruitment Summit
Here’s some information about a business summit that looks very promising. Set you calendars.
Global Career Company is pleased to announce the Careers in Africa Recruitment Summit scheduled to take place in Houston, Texas on 16-18 November 2007. The Careers in Africa Summit is a unique recruiting event, enabling leading companies to attract and interview internationally based African professionals, for their operations across Africa. This invitation-only event will feature pre-scheduled interviews, presentations and networking sessions with leading multinationals operating across Africa. Companies that have already confirmed to attend the Summit are:
- Anglo Platinum
- Barloworld
- Chevron
- Coca-Cola
- SABCO
- Cisco
- Eskom
- Heineken
- Intercontinental Bank
- Lafarge
- OPS
- Orascom
- SAB
- Shell
- Toyota
- United Bank for Africa
This list continues to grow. Available career opportunities range from entry-level graduate openings to senior management appointments and cover a variety of functions. Read more about the event, and review the attending company profiles at www.globalcareercompany.com/ciaus.
The Paris Hilton effect on Africa’s development
We live in a celebrity-powered society. I don’t like it, but it’s the truth. Whoever said everyone will get their 15 minutes of fame, was way off. It seems like the expiration date on fame is being extended longer and longer. Fame in itself is not a bad thing, however, the individualism, it comes with in today’s society is another story. With all the reality show mania and with reputable organizations paying talentless people like Paris Hilton ridiculous amounts of money for an appearance, the American culture of celebrity and individualism is playing an even bigger role in how and where money is spent in business. But if this the nature of the world we live in, where do Africans, and our culture of community and modesty, fit in?
Certainly all African’s are not so modest. However, our definition of celebrity and entitlement is definitely different from the West. Many would argue that the American definition of celebrity is based on fantasy while the African definition is based on reality. Where western celebrities are celebrated apart from the community, African celebrities are celebrated for their effect within the community. Is either definition right or wrong? Who knows, but when one dominates the other in global influence, a problem arises.
What does this have to do with business, money and Africa’s opportunities? Everything, I would say. One of the biggest problems Africans have with getting their stories told particularly in the media is that we still do not really understand how western media works. Take the picture of Paris Hilton to the left. Paris Hilton who represents, the epitome of America’s celebrity culture – and hence influence – holds a Vanity Fair Africa issue with Oprah – another more talented and influential American celebrity – on the cover. While the whole scene was definitely staged by Paris’ pr reps, it’s a classic example of the role celebrity plays in American culture. Follow me for a moment. Bono campaigns for more money to go to African aid. He recruits Oprah Winfrey, among others, to draw attention to the cause. Bono then sells the the idea to the Vanity Fair editors who stand to have multiple celebrities in one issue (celebrity faces sell glossies, especially fashion ones) and the issue is produced. Paris Hilton, then picks up the issue in her attempt to clean up her post-jail image, and in turn further sells Bono’s Africa campaign to insecure suburban teen-aged girls everywhere. Suburban American families, (with disposable income) then put money into Bono’s Africa campaign. This is the power of celebrity in American economics. While we Africans argue merit and talent, Bono continues to play the celebrity game to influence the flow of money. Many of us argue there should have been more Africans on Vanity Fair’s covers, but while Wole Soyinka is a talented man with accolades to boot, he has no influence over the people spending the money, and so he is regulated to a group feature towards the end of the magazine.
Further evidence of the power of celebrity, can be seen in the media coverage of the recent TEDGlobal conference in Tanzania. In her excellent piece about the event, Jennifer Brea, writes about the circumstances surrounding Bono’s heckling of Andrew Mwenda. The fact that Bono can have so much power as to bump George Ayittey‘s presentation of his perspective, heckle another presenter AND practically be the only one of 50 or so presenters over the 4 day African conference covered widely in the press illustrates the power of celebrity. The same issue about the difference between western and African celebrity was raised on the Africa media blog, with a reader asking
“Given the advances in technology that now allow citizens of any country to directly access the popular culture of another country (e.g. music, films, art), why do people living in the global north continue to receive more information about situations in Africa from the few Western celebrities “caring about Africa” than from the many African ones trying to push the same message? (Why do people seem to be more influenced by their similiarity with the source than the source’s actual level of expertise/connection with the cause?)”.
To this Melissa Wall of the Africa Media blog answered, “The West or North dominates global media structures and flow (much research has documented this). More specifically, reporters often have to go with the easiest-to-access sources. A Western celebrity with an entourage of handlers and PR flaks is a lot of easier to get a juicy quote from. Enlarging the Rolex is difficult.”. It all boils down to familiarity, which translates to celebrity which in-turn motivates spending. So if we Africans want access to the money which brings the opportunities we need, we have to do a better job of understanding the power of celebrity from the western perspective. As important as talent is – and it IS important – celebrity trumps talent. Sad but true.
African fashion features on Fashion Television
The always insightful program Fashion Television has two exciting podcasts on African fashion posted online. In the first feature, Egyptian Fashion, Egyptian designers talk about traditional and westernized fashion. The second is a feature on Somali-born supermodel Yasmin Warsame. Head over to the Fashion Television site to check them out.