D+C Development and Cooperation (No. 3, May/June 2000, p. 4-5)

Developing countries and development policy will be represented more strongly at Expo 2000 in Hanover, Germany, than at any world exhibition before. That is due to of the Expo focus on ‘Humankind - Nature - Technology’, which makes sustainable development a central issue. Expo 2000 (June 1-October 31) will be a forum for exchanging ideas, experiences and know-how aimed at seeking sustainable paths into the 21st century.

The ambition to chart sustainable paths to the future can only be fulfilled if the countries of the South and East take part in the debate. Three-quarters of the world population live in these countries. They offer valuable suggestions for trail-blazing solutions. Besides that, a world exhibition can only be called such if the entire world takes part in it. The German Federal government therefore has allocated special Expo funds totalling DM 100 million via the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). About three-quarters of this sum will promote the Expo presentations of poorer countries. Moreover, the substance of Germany’s cooperation with these countries is to be integrated in the exhibition’s overall concept. In other words, the objective of the German initiative is to ensure that Expo 2000 will not be a show restricted to Western industrialised nations, but a real world exhibition in terms of both participants and content.

The BMZ has commissioned the German Agency for Technical Cooperation (GTZ) with implementing the ‘Federal government’s development policy contribution to Expo 2000’. The GTZ will steer the programme in close cooperation with the ministry’s Expo 2000 Staff Unit.

More than 130 developing
and reform countries at Expo 2000

Shortly before Expo 2000 begins, it can be seen that the countries of the South and East will present outstanding contributions at the exhibition as part of its Projects Around the World module. With more than 130 developing and reform countries aiming to be in Hanover, they will be represented in greater strength than at any previous world exhibition. The BMZ and GTZ are working with about 100 of them in preparing their Expo participation. Their lively interest in the exhibition is due mainly to its claim in terms of content. The developing countries are taking this world exhibition’s motto very seriously, probably more so than are most industrialised nations. This is certainly due on the one hand to the GTZ’s conceptual support, but probably also to the fact that discussions on sustainable development in the political debate often are more important for developing countries than for industrialised nations. These countries also aim to use the opportunity to make contacts and present their own approaches to solutions. Many, such as the African states, must struggle with difficult natural conditions. Others, such as the Central Asian countries, must overcome the economic and ecological consequences of their former planned economies. Many of these experiences will flow into the country presentations at the exhibition.

Expo 2000 is, of course, not an educational event in terms of development policy. Exhibitors must combine the claim to sound content with an attractive appearance that appeals to all the senses of the visitors. If development cooperation is to capture the interest of new groups of visitors, some of its complexity has to be reduced and show elements built into the presentations. Development policy will otherwise be drowned by other impressions.

An example of how to achieve that mix is the Africa Hall, which will no doubt be a highlight of the exhibition. Forty Black African countries will present themselves together in one hall and make the diversity of their continent an exciting experience. The concept of the hall’s design and content is titled ‘The Gift of Africa’. Africa gave and gives modern art intensive stimuli, not to mention the music to whose rhythms the whole world dances. The African continent can show the world its own vital and fresh way of looking at things, whose strength sometimes overlays technological progress and can offer important contributions for the future of human culture and dealing with technology. This basic idea turns the cliché of Africa on its head. Africa is becoming a donor rather than a recipient.

German and African experts are working together on all single and joint presentations. Patterns for big sails that will cover the Africa Hall’s facades are being designed at the College of Art in Nairobi. A competition among African designers is currently underway for the design of a tall column decorated with inscriptions and figures, which as the ‘Symbol of Life’ is to be the hall’s landmark. In the 20,000 sq.-metre hall, the presentations of the some 35 countries will be positioned according to their regional grouping on the African continent. The joint presentations of the Sahel states and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries will form the cornerstones, and the single stands of the others will be grouped loosely between them. Jointly-run restaurants will give visitors the taste of Africa, and a joint bazaar will project a market atmosphere. Music, theatre and dance groups will invite their audiences to join in.

The contribution of Bhutan, which will be taking part in a world exhibition for the first time, will also convey a holistic impression which will address visitors in a rational and emotional way. The eastern Himalayan kingdom has an unusually rich fauna and flora. Rooted deeply in the Buddhist tradition, which teaches the sanctity of all forms of life, the country gives environmental protection top priority. Bhutan has largely been able to maintain the balance of its ecology, but the country is not an open-air museum. Its Expo pavilion will show how it is possible for a country to open itself to modernity without losing sight of its traditions and values. Bhutan is building an authentic Buddhist temple which will not only inform visitors about this little-known country, but also offer space for peace and quiet and mediation. After Expo, the temple will be used in a religious environment.

Projects around the world

The aim of Expo 2000 is to build a network of sustainable development among all its Projects Around the World. This is inconceivable without the activities in the developing countries. The projects show there is hardly any longer a national problem that does not have an impact on other countries or, conversely, hardly any sustainable development issue of international significance that does not have repercussions on individual countries.

These facts, which are the basis of day-to-day development cooperation, would probably remain abstract for most Expo visitors without concrete examples. The Projects Around the World module will bring these examples to the exhibition. They will illustrate to visitors that the maxim ‘Think globally, act locally’ is already being applied everywhere in the world. It is precisely the examples in the developing countries that show how sustainable development can function by linking tradition and experience with modern technology and knowledge to create something new. An example: the bushmen of Southern Africa’s Kalahari Desert are excellent trackers, but most of them cannot read or write. With the aid of a palmtop computer they can now record their observations, delivering important data to assist scientific monitoring of fauna and flora.

Initiatives of the BMZ’s partner countries therefore play a major role in Expo’s Projects Around the World. The sustainable development network aimed at by the exhibition will in the main be based on developing country projects. On behalf of the BMZ, the GTZ’s Expo 2000 Office, in particular via its network of local offices, found hundreds of recommendable projects and processed their applications for inclusion in the Expo list. The final projects were selected by an international jury chaired by Ricardo Diez Hochleitner, President of the Club of Rome, which included representatives of the BMZ and the Association of German Development NGOs (VENRO). The result is noteworthy: of the total of 487 projects nominated, more than 300 are from developing and reform countries. The spectrum ranges from securing peace for the Tuareg in Mali, to small hydro-electric power stations in the Himalayas and solar telephones on the islands of the Philippines.

Expo as stage for civil society

So far, the actors at world exhibitions have been exclusively states. The Expo 2000 Projects Around the World module gives for the first time the so-called civil society the opportunity to take an active part in designing such an exhibition. In line with the BMZ guidelines, the GTZ’s search for suitable projects focused on German and international NGOs. They are participating in more than 200 of the nominated projects. Among the German NGOs whose projects were recommended are German Agro Action, Misereor, Bread for the World, and the German Foundation for World Population.

Many countries have integrated Projects Around the World in their presentations. Tanzania, for instance, will illustrate by two projects - its Selous game park and the Chumbe Island coral park - how income-generating tourism and nature preservation can be linked with each other long-term.

The subject of development policy is also integrated in Expo’s Theme Park, the heart of the exhibition. Four forest preservation projects, for example, will be seen in the park’s Environment section alone. But the real ‘home’ of this Expo element is the Global House, directly on the Expo Plaza. The BMZ will present German development cooperation here at a 600 sq.-metre exhibition space. Based on 40 Projects Around the World, the ministry will give an in-depth and exciting insight into the range and diversity of German development policy and its actors.

Development agencies in
Expo’s Global House

The Carl Duisberg Society (CDG) will also be represented in the Global House. It will feature a glass classroom in which a total of more than 4,000 of its trainees will study during the five-month course of the exhibition. The GTZ will set up a stand here with a VIP lounge and a meeting point. The objective is to provide visitors with a contact point for development policy topics and enable them to talk to development professionals. In another pavilion, opposite the Global House, the Reconstruction Loan Corporation (KfW) will be represented with a 1,500 sq.-metre presentation focusing mainly on promotion of small to medium-sized businesses. Financial Cooperation projects, including recognised Projects Around the World will also be presented here. Finally, the Global House will also contain a café with a stage on which an extensive and varied events programme organised by the GTZ on behalf of the BMZ will take place. The programme will feature contributions by the Global House exhibitors, the BMZ interface organisations, and other groups interested in development policy. The aim is to bring Expo visitors together with people who are working in Projects Around the World on sustainable solutions for the world of tomorrow. Politicians, economists, academics, practicians and unconventional thinkers in development cooperation in Asia, Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe will come to the Global House to discuss their knowledge with others. GTZ experts based in Germany and abroad will talk to interested visitors from around the world. The wealth of events related to development policy will also include a cultural programme in the Africa Hall and a multi-section magazine in the German Pavilion.

Global dialogues on topics of the
21st century

Expo 2000 offers development policy a great opportunity to engender support for topics that are decisively important for our common future but which unfortunately too rarely reach a wide public. The exhibition aims to enthral as many people as possible. The Expo theme of Humankind - Nature -Technology will not be presented in a superficial way, but certainly entertainingly and aimed at having the widest possible appeal.

In order, however, to go into the pressing issues of the 21st century in greater depth, also in terms of content, a series of 10 specialist conferences titled Global Dialogues is to take place at the exhibition. Practitioners, academics, decision-takers and representatives of Projects Around the World will spend three days a time at the Expo to exchange experiences and discuss approaches to solutions.

One of the most important topics of the future is without doubt combating poverty. It is the focus of the Global Dialogue ‘Fighting Poverty - Social Innovations and New Coalitions’, which the GTZ is organising on behalf of the BMZ for July 25-27.

The aim of this dialogue is not to discuss the entire range of the topic of poverty yet again, but to focus on social innovations and new coalitions. In particular, fresh approaches to the cooperation of governments, the private sector and target groups in alleviating poverty are to be pointed out.

Thus, development policy in all its facets will be an integral part of the world exhibition. To make the policy recognisable for Expo visitors, the BMZ has had a logo developed: three stylised persons forming a circle that can also be perceived as a globe. The logo can be seen as a symbol for solidarity, equality and partnership between North and South, East and West, men and women, and governments, civil society and business. It stands for a development policy in which all interact.

The logo is to be a trademark of development policy’s great involvement in Expo 2000, and be seen everywhere by visitors and non-visitors alike. The latter will see it on the exhibition’s Internet site. Those who go to Hanover will come across it around the exhibition grounds and in the electronic information system for visitors. That helps orientation and stimulates curiosity. Interest can grow out of curiosity, and interest can create understanding.