For Tomorrow - A Documentary about Grassroots Innovators (2022) - full transcript

A long time ago, high in the mountains
where fast rivers run,

a tree lit the spark of inspiration.

The people of the mountains
saw that they could train the tree’s roots

across the water

and forge them into a bridge.

That power to recognize possibilities,

to really see,

lives inside of us.

Like a root bridge, it can connect us

to the world,

to the wisdom of our past,



to those who come after us.

Water is fundamental in agriculture.

Here, every drop of water
costs us too much.

Today, unfortunately,
we don't have the same amount,

the same volume of water
that we had 50 years ago.

The terraces and the platforms,
as you can see,

allow us to have an effective...

irrigation system.

And we are able to reduce

the soil erosion that we have on land,

which is already pretty damaged.

We want to make many terraces,
like the ones you see here,

so we can face climate change.

Grassroots innovations are built
by the people, for the people,



as they build resilience
towards the local challenges

they face every day.

It’s really imperialistic to think

that solutions come
from the industrial technical world down.

There are probably millions of pieces
of knowledge

which are incredibly powerful
for solving global problems

that we have no idea
because we’re not even looking for them.

Right here,
those are the little monkey bars.

These are the little things to go up with

and I’m kind of tall for it
but usually we’re on top of this.

I’m going to break the house.

So, my name is Gitanjali Rao,
I’m 15 years old

and I'm an innovator, author

and promoter of science, technology,
engineering and math,

especially for students and youth.

This is my science kit.

This is something my uncle gave me
when I was four years old.

And it's very…

busted,

to say the least.

I was inspired by the water crisis
in Flint, Michigan about three years ago.

And it was absolutely appalling to see

how many kids my age were basically
drinking a poison every single day.

So, I created something like Tethys

which is an easy-to-use, at-home tool
for lead in drinking water.

This is a breadboard
that everything gets hooked up into

and this is a lithium-ion battery.

And it comes with this cartridge
that gets dipped into the water

and then tests
if you have clean drinking water.

We’ve created a stereotype

of what innovation is
across the past 50 years.

You look for a particular person, right?

A mad scientist, who's typically white,
who's typically old,

and who’s typically a male.

I'm not that! I'm not at all
what you see on the media.

Innovation, to me,
is the process of thinking differently

to solve a problem
in the world around you.

Our generation is growing up in a place

where we’re seeing problems
that have never existed before.

And right now innovation needs all of us,
no matter our age, gender or race.

We have to maximize innovation
and creativity together.

The seed of potential
lives within each of us.

Every day, people face challenges
with ingenuity and vision.

How they work,
where they find inspiration,

can help us all find new ways
to build a better tomorrow.

I researched this project for a long time.

From 2012 to 2017.

I saved these samples from 2017,

2019 and 2018.

When I moved here to work,
the garbage truck had broken down.

Wow, why does trash smell so bad?

Trucks breaking down is inevitable.
It will happen sooner or later.

At the time, I thought,

“If only there were a way
to turn trash into money.

The environment would be much cleaner.”

I am not an expert in biology

I mean, I wasn’t trained in it.

It’s not my expertise.

My name is Trinh Thi Hong.

I’m the director of a company

that recycles organic waste
into cleaning products.

This is the Imagination Book.
This is where all ideas are born.

This is where all ideas are nurtured.

And this is where I write
whatever thing I think or imagine.

This is actually the Galileo Generator.

And then you can see
this is a different model.

And these are the materials:

a solar switch, transformer, battery…

I have so much concern
about the environment.

I want to see how best
I will minimize air pollution.

My dad is a welder.

He’s so talented.

I would help him do a lot of things.

I also learned how to do these things.
I do it for myself.

I call this Imagination Light
because it’s everything that I imagined.

I decided to create this light
to help people

that do not have access to electricity.

This is a sketch of the car
I want to build.

It has a solar panel
that acts as a source of energy.

After I’ve created a first prototype,
then I want to expand.

As a youth, I have to play a major role.

I have to help people,
I have to help society,

I have to help my country.

I’m Jamila Mammadli,
it’s Jamila Mammadli in my own language.

I currently live in Baku.

I'm 27 years old for now.

I’m currently working as a copywriter
at my company, it’s a television company.

Baku is something new and something old.

Many people can enjoy it here
if you're a tourist.

But for me,
it’s kind of a challenging place to be.

I moved here three years ago.

I lived in some really small village,
a really green place to be,

it was really nice…

But there weren’t many opportunities
for me so I had to move to Baku.

I just came to the big city and I thought,
“It should be so much easier!”

It wasn’t… to my surprise.

I enjoy discovering new places.

Okay, maybe not all the places
are accessible for me.

Of course, I’m a wheelchair user
so I can’t move around freely,

I can’t enjoy myself without thinking,

“Can I go there without any help
or maybe obstacles?”

But I know that it’s like that
for most of the world.

We're not an accessible world,
unfortunately.

When I first got to use the metro,

I was new in the city
and was really scared.

Before me, it was illegal to use the metro
with wheelchairs.

Yeah! It was a real thing,
so it was really challenging for me,

not only physically but even mentally.

I had to fight.

Many times,
the people who are economically poor…

are not intellectually poor.

Wealth has no relationship with wisdom.

You can have a lot of wealth
and you may be foolish,

and a person who is economically very poor
may be very wise.

I’m Anil Gupta, professor,

taught at Indian Institute of Management,
Ahmedabad for about 40 years,

and I also founded Honey Bee Network

around 34 years ago.

It’s a database for democratizing
the grassroots innovations,

innovations from
and innovations for grassroots.

So it’s a voluntary effort,
we have been doing this walk for decades,

adding wings to the imagination
by not just looking at what people lack,

but what people are good at.

We try to learn from four teachers
in every learning walk: a teacher within,

a teacher around us,

a teacher in nature,

and a teacher among common people.

You take good care
of the animals, don't you?

What do you feed them
to yield better quality milk?

We feed them jaggery
and groundnut shells

which contain various nutrients
and vitamins

that are good for the animals.

To help cure their colds,

I smoke eucalyptus leaves
for them to inhale.

Honoring creative people
at their doorstep makes a big difference!

There were occasions when people
in the village

didn’t know about that… enough.

Sometimes they didn’t know at all!

We never knew
that he was doing this experiment.

And, of course, this process of visibility
gives currency to these creative ideas,

otherwise they get lost.

We often have a challenge
as to how can formal systems,

policymakers, financial systems,

how can they take note?

How can they hear them?

So I’m convinced
that if we want inclusive development,

we should encourage diversity.

And we should also encourage
differences of opinions,

differences of views,
differences in the ways we solve problems.

Minds on the margin…
are not marginal minds.

People have always been dreaming up ways
to make life better for those around them.

But too often, their work gets lost
in a noisy world.

Now, however,
others are starting to listen.

I’ve always believed
in the mission of the United Nations.

You know, those first three words,
“We the people”,

really mean something
when you look at the state of the world

as it is right now.

So, the United Nations
Development Programme was set up in 1965.

It’s a $5 billion a year organization

with 17,000 people working on it,
spanning across 170 countries.

What we saw happening was
that the pace of change was accelerating.

In climate problems, in poverty issues,
even in technological developments,

the pace of change
on the outside world was actually faster

than what we were able to keep up with
on the inside of our own organization.

So, the kind of traditional approach
to development,

basically, is with a perspective that
you need economists to look at data,

to understand the problem,
to analyze the problem, to make a plan,

and then have the plan delivered

and then people are better off
and the world is a safer and better place.

They’re saying,
“This is what we’re here to do for you.”

But the kinds of problems
that you have in the world today:

You’ve got increasing droughts,
increasing flooding,

loss of crop yields,

the growth of violent extremism.

These are the kinds of problems
that change by the minute,

and they depend on the actions
of eight billion people around the world.

They’re not the kind of problems

that you can sit behind a desk,
in an office like this one

and design a plan to solve.

We started looking at various research,

and one of the things we looked at was
a piece of research

where they were looking at the problem
of recurrent flooding in Indonesia.

They found a fellow named Made Kusama

who was almost obsessively taking care
of black soldier flies.

As it turns out, they eat the waste
that occurs in irrigation canals,

and where the black soldier flies
were protected,

the farms were safer from floods.

You could put agricultural experts,

you could put equity experts
of all kinds in a room,

give them coffee for three days
and they would never come out with:

“Protect and love
the black soldier flies.”

We were inspired by the idea that
that kind of a solution was so different

and so off our radar
that we must be missing something.

It’s the people closest to the problem

who have the most knowledge
about that problem.

At first, I had to ask people for trash.

My house was full of it.

I made a batch every 2-3 days.

When it started to smell, I threw it out.

It was an endless cycle.

Three parts sugar, three parts waste
and 10 parts water.

Little by little,
from small bottles to big bottles.

Now we have three cleaning products.

I wanted three things.
First, for our environment to be cleaner.

Second, to help disadvantaged people
have a more stable life.

They might not be rich, but at least
they’re not hungry anymore.

Hi Trang,

Wow, it must be a year
since my last visit.

At first, she taught me how to make it

in a paint bucket, a small one.

I was very scared back then
because it really stank.

After three months I mastered it
and started making it on my own.

When are you going to deliver this month?

Either on the 31st or 1st.

When Lieu is back from her dialysis,

I’ll bring her here, okay?

Can you show her how to make it?

About 50% of the company’s workforce

are disadvantaged people

who work with me to build the production
system within the community.

When they have a more stable life,
we will have a better life too.

I prefer working during the night
because it’s a quiet time

and there are less distractions
compared to the day.

So during the night is the best time
for me

to do all my research and imagine.

Yeah.

Anytime I think of this story,
I feel so heartbreaking of what happened.

Just imagine losing an entire family.

One of my close neighbors,
they were using a fossil fuel generator

during the night
for their children to study.

They placed the generator very close
to the window of the living room.

And then what happened,

the poisonous fume from this generator
was entering the living room,

unknown to them.

So they fell asleep
and I and my dad went there.

And we tried to wake them up,
but no one responded.

I was like, "Dad, what happened?"

No one was alive,
so all of them were dead.

So now, I went back
and started doing some research

to see how best I could come up
with something to stop this problem.

This is my favorite toy,

and it reminds me of my childhood.

It calms me down.

I love to use it when I work on something.

It gives me inspiration.

My innovation,

if I have to call myself an innovator,

starts from trying to do something
more accessible for all people.

I want to show the world
that I can live my life

if you give me some options
to live my life more smoothly.

Yes, I’m working currently.
I have some income.

I can use the taxi all the time,
whenever I want.

But I choose to use the metro.
I choose to use the bus.

I know it might lead to a brighter future
for wheelchair users.

So, I just wrote a letter to our metro
about how I want to use the metro,

and they just answered me,

“It's inaccessible because escalators
are really dangerous for wheelchairs,

so they can’t.”

When all the people around you
think you're limited…

you tend to believe it too.

Faith makes us resilient.

If we really believe in our ideas,
no boundaries can contain us.

The Khasi tribe saw the potential

in a simple tree’s roots
breaking through rock

and reaching out over water.

They nurtured these dreams,

knowing they might take decades
to bear fruit.

Strength of vision like this drives us on.

You know, as a world, we're growing,

but we have to make sure
that nobody’s left behind.

Everybody’s equal
and they should move together.

I think the first story, almost,

when we have kind of designed
the whole bag,

and we have incorporated the light in it,

which we have made it hands-free

so that the kids don’t have to worry
about charging it all the time.

I give them a small idea booklet,
mechanical tools,

so some kits we have designed
and some kits we got from certain people.

This generation is totally dependent
on innovation.

My whole motto is to really motivate them

and tell them that if any problem comes,

you have to find solutions
within your surroundings.

What is 'jugaad'? (frugal innovation)

You need to think of frugal innovations
to solve problems around you.

Needs at home,

your siblings or teachers
at school may need something.

If it rains heavily and there's a flood,
how do we move from one place to another?

I feel like they have
a lot of interesting ideas.

They impact me a lot.

Because sometimes my brain is biased.

I see a particular thing in a certain way.

But they were like,

"This can also happen in another manner."
I was like, "Yeah, you're right!"

We'll use the table to make a raft

and we'll use the legs of the table
as paddles and row ourselves out.

Who's sitting on the raft?

-Ma'am, that's me.
-It's you? Okay, very nice.

Being marginalized
is a very difficult situation.

You don’t know where your life is going.

You see on the television,
you see on the Internet

so many people are succeeding,

and you don’t know the way,
how to reach there.

We have to be responsible
as we're training new generations.

We have to reach to each and every corner
of the mountains and rivers.

Even if they're living
in the remotest area, you can do it.

Simply, you can do it.

For me, I’m living in a part of the world
where it’s very challenging,

and sometimes, for me to have access
to the Internet is quite difficult

because we have issues,
we have a big problem with electricity.

Based on what I saw and the incident
that happened to my close neighbor,

it inspired me to come up
with a possible solution

to do something
that would be environmentally friendly.

So a solar car to help people in society,

I think that we could impact their life.

I find myself in some part of Africa

and it’s very difficult for us
to get raw material.

Especially when you want to do
some projects

and the required material
is not out there.

So the only place
where we can get the required material

is called the trash yard.

You know, I have this dream,
I have this passion to help Sierra Leone.

We have people that have talent.

We have people that are capable
of doing good things in society,

but they don’t have the opportunity.

It was hard work.

If I hadn’t put my heart and soul into it,

I don’t think I could have done it.

I tried everything,
but I wasn’t successful.

It was my passion and my dream.

It’s actually really difficult
to come up with a recipe or an idea.

No one believed me.
My neighbor said I was insane.

That my ideas were illusions
and couldn’t be done.

Even my husband thought I was crazy.

I really enjoy acting, of course I do.

I’m used to attention.

People look at me all the time,

who stare at me for a long long long time,
a really long time.

So it wasn’t scary for me,
I have to admit.

Yes, my life is normal for me,

but it’s abnormal for many people.

If you don’t see around it,
you don’t normalize it.

Like, wheelchair users can use the metro.

So my friend came to me and said,

“You should use it
and make it common sense.”

And then it just came to me,
"Why not film it?"

I came here from Hezi Aslanov stop.
I won't say I came here by myself,

because I came here with my friend,
with the help of others.

But I was able to get on the subway.
It's possible.

You can do it too.

When I grew up,
I didn’t have any representation

and I didn’t know how to do, what to do…

I just had to get it for myself.

It was a really blank space for me.

And when I think that there are young,
disabled children

who don’t know what to do with their life,

I really feel sad.

It’s the only time
when I feel sad, I guess.

So, as a person who did all these things
by herself,

why should people listen to me?

Because when I talk about something,
I talk with experience.

There are solutions out there
that farmers are doing,

that street vendors are working on.

We need to look at those solutions

to be willing to learn
from everyone and anyone.

The economic model we have is driven
by depletion of natural resources,

it’s also creating massive inequalities.

We're getting to the point
where people don't want to listen.

Because they feel the pressure so much
on themselves,

and it’s so much easier
to listen to a narrative

that is divisive rather than unifying.

I believe the world needs
a United Nations.

But a lot about the United Nations needs
to open up,

it needs to modernize, it needs to learn.

And so much of this is about that.

We started this Accelerator Lab Network
in 2019.

We try and tap into the distributed
knowledge and perception

and practices of women and men

who are facing the effects
of climate change,

who are living in poverty
and who have a lot to contribute

to putting the planet
on a more sustainable path.

We're shifting the paradigm here.

The United Nations Development Programme
is saying to the world,

"We don't know everything,

and we need this heavy doubling down
on local knowledge."

So in each of our Accelerator Labs,
we have a Head of Solutions Mapping.

Their job is to connect us more
to the people

that we serve, their inventions,
their ingenuity, their entrepreneurship.

Now, we've got a network of these 91 labs
around the world

who are able to learn from each other.

We work alongside government partners
and university partners and others.

And then we invite them to come with us
on this journey

so that they're co-designing with us.

That's really where you start
to make transformation.

I’m based in Ghana,

and my job is just mapping
grassroots solutions

to development challenges.

Seventy percent of the country’s economy
is informal.

So if you’re ignoring 70%,

I’m not saying there's something wrong
with the model,

I’m saying we should also speak
to the informal sector.

Imagine, within an organization
that’s carried on for 60-plus years.

And they’re talking
big macroeconomic ideas,

and they have the big budgets
to do these huge projects,

and then the Administrator creates a unit.

There are colleagues who are willing

and open to learning from us
and sharing with us.

So it's an ongoing process.

A system is designed to produce
exactly the results that it’s producing.

I got into the World Bank at 25 years old

and eventually became the Vice President
for South Asia.

We managed a portfolio of $36 billion,

had thousands of staff
and had a very large budget, $100 million.

There were a lot of problems
that we were trying to fix.

We called them,
"The Wicked Development Problems"

that could not be solved
from the top down.

I could see these amazing organizations
that were actually solving that problem,

but we could not connect them

because of the business model
of the World Bank.

And so, it was very frustrating
not to be able, with all those resources,

not to be able to actually help
those organizations,

grassroots, social entrepreneurs
who had the solution

but were not able to scale.

And then that’s when I left.

And I realized,
“This is as far as I can get.”

It was like the confirmation of something
that you know in your gut,

and not rejecting,
but actually understanding it

as part of a whole system
that needs to change.

This is nice!

I just saw them on the road…
and I’m trying to look at them.

This is what I use for my Imagination Car.

Meet Emmanuel Alie Mansaray,

a 24-year-old geology student
of Fourah Bay College.

Emmanuel has just created Sierra Leone's
first locally made solar-powered car

that is eco-friendly and does not use
or need to use any form of fuel.

First of all, my dad was the first person
to see this on social media.

And then he went to my door and knocked.

“Emmanuel, wake up!
I see this on Facebook, it’s you?”

I said, “Yes, dad, it’s me.”

My dad was so happy and my mom,
they were dancing.

That day they cooked good for me,
so I eat a lot, drink a lot!

It was like a party at home.

So I really feel good.

Anytime this car is in the streets,
it causes traffic, serious traffic.

People will stop their car.

“We want to see this car!"

People are shouting, even the bike riders,
like the motor riders.

They will be behind me,
escorting me like a president.

And I was like, “Wow!”

People accept what I’m doing
so I have this kind of joy.

I feel good because people accept
what I do for them.

Proudly made in Sierra Leone!
Green, white and blue!

All of my friends, my community of people,

“Congratulations, Emmanuel.
You have done well. We're proud of you.”

My dad said, “Yes, son, this is just
the start. More to come for you.”

I said, “Yes, dad. Amen."

Then I started the GoFundMe campaign.

My target was $10,000,
and what I've earned is something like $700.

Sometimes I feel discouraged, asking myself:

"People don't trust me, people don't like what I'm doing."

So, this makes me so sad.

Because you have this vision,
you have this passion to help people.

And then you see your product
not scaling up. It’s so painful.

After my video went viral,
the Baku Metro just contacted me

and told me that there’s a new project,

"It’s not a perfect solution
but it might work."

And they wanted me
to be the first user of it.

So, of course, I agreed.

It was a new opportunity for me

to make my city
and my country more accessible.

And mostly giving input
on how to make this project

more accessible and understandable.

We choose the time,
choose the place, that’s it.

But there's one little problem,
you have to call one hour beforehand

because not all the stations have
that accommodation,

so they have to send their workers.

It’s really frustrating.

Some people have the vision in their mind
that it can help people with wheelchairs,

but actually it doesn’t.

Because you don’t know.

You aren't them.

You didn’t have that life.

Yes, it will be an improvement,

but we have a long way to go.

Hi Lieu,

I would have come sooner
if not for the pandemic.

This is a notebook for you to take notes.

I could give you the printed recipe.

but you would not remember.

Later, when I show you,
write down what I say.

We only need 3 things:
sugar, waste and water

to make the finished product.

Of course I can’t guarantee

that you will get rich
or get out of poverty.

But you’ll be able
to put food on the table.

Now let’s go inside and I’ll show you.

This is the board of orders.

We got many orders today.

But we only process one order per day.

We've sent our products
to 63 provinces and cities.

I hope we can sell more

because then we could help more people.

At first, I actually didn’t think of it
as a business idea.

I only thought about sharing with people.

I have shared it
with more than 1,000 women in Da Nang

so they could make it at home.

Then they could use it
to clean their kitchens and their homes.

My biggest dream
is to do something for the community

to return the support I received
when I was a child.

I am from a big family.

I am the 10th and the youngest.

My father died when my mother
was six months pregnant with me.

My mom died
when I was one month and eight days old.

Because of the war,

I was separated from my family
when I was two years old.

The soldiers found me in the mountains

and they brought me with them
on their march in Truong Son.

They sent me to a place
that was housing ten people.

One night, it rained so hard.

The rain was terrible.
The spot where I slept got wet.

A woman brought me inside
and she slept on my wet spot.

I still remember it today.
How could someone be so kind?

In 2016,
when I took part in a startup contest

many people knew about the idea
and the project I was working on.

I got offers to sell from 2016 to 2019,

but I refused every time.

I started this with the hope
of supporting the people around me.

If I sell, I can’t help them anymore.

That was the simple reason
why I didn’t sell it,

even though
I was strapped for cash back then.

If I had sold it then,
I could have made 5 billion VND.

That was a massive amount of money then,
unlike today.

I said at the beginning
that I didn't start this for the money.

I am not doing this
to make loads and loads of money.

I just need a stable life.

So when I thought,

if I sold this company
those people would be helpless

and they would have to go back
to their old life,

I just couldn’t do it.

The way we framed innovation,
it’s the inventor.

It’ll be this commercial success,
and then grows and spreads.

And now we celebrate
and they get a TED Talk.

Good for that person.

Maybe not so good for the community.

Sometimes that locks up the innovation,
and no one else can use it.

And then it becomes, also, a rule

for what is accepted legally
or regulated away.

We love hero stories, we’re humans.

So we love the hero story.

We love the story of an individual
that has made it against the odds.

So along with the story of the hero,

we hope that the story of the problem
they were trying to solve… comes along.

When you look at something that's working
for the people who live there,

and you come in
with this problematized frame

and we’re going to solve it,

then you lose out on the innovation
and energy that’s actually going on.

And you lose out on supporting that,
and most likely,

you’re going to damage it
with your solution.

The problem is not going to be solved

only by individuals
coming up with solutions.

They’re going to be solved by systems.

So hopefully we get
beyond the hero stories,

to then ask, "What was that system
that needed changing?"

and "How can we bring resources
and power to solve that problem?"

Imagine a river
in the mountains of Meghalaya, India.

The roots of a rubber fig tree break out
of the bank, reaching over the water.

Starting on your side,
you begin to build a bridge from them.

Looking up, you see others building
from the other side.

Wouldn’t the best way to cross
that river be to meet in the middle?

It's been about ten years now

that the climate has been affecting us.

The climate has become disorganized.
It's not like it used to be.

In the last ten years
things have gotten a lot worse.

That is why most of the population

have already decided
to rebuild the platforms.

Here in Ancocala,

we are using a combination

of natural and hand-made infrastructure.

And we have also recovered

the ancestral knowledge
that comes from the Incas

so that we can adapt
and have more water

not only during the rainy season,
but during the dry season too.

If it weren't for the terraces,

I know that the soil

would have been destroyed
by the flow of the water

and we wouldn't have
an acceptable level of production.

They're not professionals,

they're not educated people,

but they've been able
to complete projects

to do construction.

We're trying to make
the community self-sustaining.

because otherwise
people would migrate to the cities.

These local innovations

should not just stay in Ancocala.

They should spread
to other places in the Andes

and hopefully throughout the world.

I tried to talk about this project
to all the people that I met

because it needs to be known.

Recently, we were in conversation
with another government institution.

They were talking about
a new project for the handicapped.

I said: "Yes, but I don't have a problem
with the work you do."

Problem is, handicapped people
don't participate in those projects.

They decide for you.

Yes, this is the problem.

I would be happy with the work
if there was a level of participation.

But if I don't participate,
if I don't have a say,

-you can't say it's work done for me.
-Right.

Actually, we have
a comprehensive slogan at the UN,

about the inclusion of the handicapped.

"Nothing about us without us."

Yes! That’s the point!

So when we look at the kinds
of grassroots innovations

that we set out to map
and document and amplify.

If we don’t see those
as innovations in the first place,

if we don’t see people,
regardless of how much money they have,

or where they live,
or how much education they have,

as owners of knowledge.

Then, yes, their great ideas,
their ingenuity is not being counted.

Unless you're counted, you don’t exist,
which is an enormous shame,

given the state of the world today,
which needs everything we can throw at it.

So that’s why now we have
this global innovation ecosystem.

It’s more about connecting
than it's about collecting,

so it’s exciting
because we’re going to start to see

more and more solutions
and connect them to each other

to hopefully make some breakthroughs.

We need a global platform
that will not merely search for solutions

but also spread them as DIY solutions,
do-it-yourself solutions.

International networks
often arrange and facilitate networking

among the professionals,
among the policymakers,

among the managers of the system.

But what is becoming possible
that this partnership now

can connect people themselves.

I'm heading into Conakry, Guinea,
to meet with colleagues and innovators

to partner with them,
to collaborate with them, to share ideas,

to see how best we can bring up
possible solutions to help our people.

Actually, we met
on the for Tomorrow platform.

We're all changemakers,
we're all innovators sharing ideas,

as well as scaling them up
to become something big in society.

I've never traveled out of Sierra Leone.

This will be my first adventure taking
such a trip.

Yeah, I’m so excited.

I've been working in Africa
for over 30 years.

I’ve been developing a project
that involves creating a new vehicle,

it’s a solar-powered electric tricycle
to reduce CO2 emissions

and to bring electricity
to the farthest regions.

We started chatting, Emmanuel and I,
on the platform,

and we had an interesting exchange,

and we were looking forward
to meeting in person in Conakry.

Yeah, the connection was so great.
I would say that's a very good bridge.

They showed me the lab.

-This is the lab?
-Yeah, this is the lab, the fab lab.

Everything was all about electronics.

Wow, a drone!

This one is for us to see the circuits
inside this one.

The oxygenator, it helps you get oxygen
from outside.

And we have this kind of connection.

We have this kind
of collaborative partnership.

We're going to work together.

I think people all over the world
are facing the same difficulties,

and there's a clear need
for technological infrastructure

that can connect people
going through similar problems

and with which they can solve them.

I think that at this time,
platforms such as 'for Tomorrow' and 'ZERO1NE'

can play a pivotal role
in achieving that goal.

Hello Jamila, I’m Young-jin from Korea.

Hi!

It would be better to speak in Korean
with my translator, okay?

Okay, first question.

When did you start using the wheelchair?

I started using a wheelchair at 13.

At 13?

He’d like to know
how you can improve a wheelchair.

Do you have any ideas in mind?

I would love to, when I can,
modify my wheelchair by myself

because it’s really hard
to find someone to fix it.

In your project, I would love to see
some wheelchairs that I can fix,

I can adjust the height
or other things by myself,

not needing anyone else.

We need to be more efficient
and bring concrete improvements

to cope with the many challenges
of the future.

I've come to realize
that the answer to all those challenges

lie in people's creativity.

The private sector
has to be part of the solution.

You need multidiscipline.
You cannot just come from one discipline.

You need ways of tapping
from the very rich grassroot world

and information and assets that there are
in order to make a difference.

Hi, my name is Sung-geun Park
and I’m a solar systems engineer.

Hello, my name is Rira Kang.

I'm Emmanuel Alie Mansaray.

I’m Balde Tiguidanké
and I’m the managing partner

responsible for market access
of Solar E-Cycle, with Roger.

This is Paola Constantino
from Guatemala UNDP Accelerator Lab.

I'm Head of Solutions Mapping.

My name is Alfredo Maul,
I’m also from Guatemala.

I’m a frugal innovator.

We have actually completed
our working prototype

that could be replicated
not only in the Americas

but also in other parts of the world.

I’d like to know what kind of obstacles
you're facing now.

Maybe we can help.

There are 600 million people
that don’t have access

to electricity in Africa.

So a solar-powered vehicle
with a battery pack

could bring electricity
to anybody’s home in Africa.

In the rural areas,
we don’t have infrastructure like cities.

We have very narrow roads,
probably the topography is really hard.

So when you think about the e-tricycle,

when you think about
the Imagination Solar Car that Emmanuel

and the solar tuk-tuk here in Guatemala,

people are responding
to the local conditions.

And I think that, here, we have the chance
to look ahead, to look forward.

If I may start,
by listening to what you've said today,

we've discovered many things
we hadn't thought of.

It's been a real eye-opener.

So networking people
across the world is always helpful, right?

And it's powerful.

Is it enough?

No, it never is, right?
It never is enough.

It’s a great step.

But bringing visibility to it elevates it

and maybe changes the narrative

of how we should solve problems
in the world.

We really want to change the way
that people think about development.

This is actually giving new meaning
to “We the people.”

This is saying, "There's intelligence,
there's invention, there's creativity,

there's power in all eight billion of us."

You do what you can
with whatever you have.

You look around, you see what’s wrong.
You think, "How can I improve it?",

"How can I make it better?",

"How can I change my life
or change the life of people around me?"

You don’t need to be
a technologically savvy person

or an IT person to make an innovation.

You can genuinely solve
a problem of your community

and that will be the innovation as well.

If it’s new and refreshing,
and helps, it has an impact.

I consider myself as a soldier.

I just fight for something I believe.

I use my knowledge, I use my words,
I use my confidence to fight.

I know there’s a lot of people
who still think I’m limited.

Because their visions are limited.

Can we teach ourselves to really see?

Can we unlearn what blinds us

to the potential
that exists where we least expect it?

Like the Khasi people who keep
the knowledge of their ancestors alive

with their root bridges.

We can see what we need
to cross to the other side.

For ourselves, for each other...

For Tomorrow.

We all have something to learn,
and we all have something to teach.

We need to come together.

We need to find new
and innovative ways of working together.

The challenges we face today aren’t going
to be solved by individual heroes.

They're going to be solved
by communal efforts.

What would be your message
to the rest of the world?

I would like to tell the whole world...

to value what they have,

the water, the air and the landscape.

It's much better to have more plants

than many buildings.

You could say that water is life.

You can be happy
in this life, on this planet.

Well done!