Weather permitting; as summer creeps in, Washington is alive with multiple meetings of international standards these days.
The French speaking state of Senegal had its debut in the conference agenda as the international development community, the private sector and non-governmental investors discussed investment opportunities and constraints in Senegal.
The lively programme explored the results of analytic tools on investment decisions for economic growth and poverty reduction and the government of Senegal’s National Growth strategy in the energy and business environment sectors. Speakers include Senegalese Minister of Economy, Finance and Planning, Amadou Ba, Minister of Energy, Theirno Alassane Sall and Thomas Kelly of the Department of Policy and Evaluation, Millennium Challenge Corporation.
Hard on the heels of the conference was a three day meeting on “navigating the African market” focusing on doing business with African states specifically on laws, regulations and policies of the United States and African countries.
The session discussed how to stimulate greater US-Africa economic engagement, access to fuel mutually beneficial partnerships between US and African businesses.
The economic charged meeting highlighted smart and efficient policies and regulations and provided examples of where it is happening in the US and the African continent.
Delegates highlighted some 400 African companies with annual revenue exceeding $1 billion that are likely to provide $5.6 trillion business opportunities in household consumption by 2025 and forecast that Africa could nearly double its manufacturing output from $500 billion today to $980 billion in 2025.
An American photographer was left paralyzed for seven hours after stepping on an adders nest in a popular woodland backyard.
John Kiermein had parked his car to get a sightseeing shot of a river when he instantly felt a ting on his leg.
Within minutes of being bitten, the 54 year old could not feel his body from the chin down after suffering a severe reaction.
He summoned strength to swipe his phone to call for help as he had no idea what was happening.
“I was paralyzed for several minutes and tried to wave to people but felt so weak to even lift my hand.”
Eventually, he managed to muster strength to have a sip of an energy drink.
“That drink saved me because it gave me enough strength to do three things – check that the car was on neutral, turn on the engine and shout for help. That means I am alive today as if I had not that drink, I would have been dead. I was like a drunken zombie.”
An ambulance rushed him to hospital where he was given anti venom. In all, he spent four days in hospital where he made a full recovery.
Interested in going to the planet Mars in 2033? Well you can check to follow the trend.
One of the most spirited and emotionally charged meetings held was the Human to Mars discussion held at the George Washington University the other day.
Aeronautic experts and members of the Plenary Society discussed the feasibility and worked out costs for a crewed mission to Mars in 2033 .
“We are at an advanced take off planning to be airborne, rather space borne in 15 years’ time,” an organizer reassured me in response to my question.
“We have a long list of would be passengers as we are working out a landing solution,” she added.
A quip from a TV producer at the meeting perhaps summed it all.
“We will wait for you on earth so that you can come back to tell us how it all went,” he said amidst cracks of laughter.
While we keep our feet on earth, researchers swabbed a number of steering wheels of vehicles and found nearly nine times more germs than on public toilet seats.
By Rod Mac-Johnson
Monday May 22, 2017.
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