One year ago I was travelling to Gaborone, Botswana, with colleagues from across Lancaster University. We were selected to support the RECIRCULATE project in delivering a week-long workshop around Knowledge Exchange (KE) and Engagement to a group of businesses, NGOs, researchers and university professionals from across Africa. I work in the Centre for Global Eco-Innovation, which supports business-led solutions to global environmental challenges. Our motto is, ‘Better for business, better for the environment’, and we believe all innovation should be eco-innovation. RECIRCULATE brings this ideology to Africa and addresses the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

A lot has happened over the last 12 months – A new US administration has come into power, the UK left the European Union and there is an ongoing a global pandemic! In addition to this, WWF-backed analysis published last year revealed that the number of global fires in 2020 was 13% higher than in 2019 – itself a record year.

In a year of disruption, loss and rapid change we also see what we’re capable of. Now more than ever we have an opportunity to reconsider the way we live.

During the trip, I had the pleasure of working alongside 40 amazing individuals from very diverse countries and communities. It was an incredibly humbling and inspiring week. As well as delivering part of the training, I’ve also benefited from the learning offered by my colleagues and other attending delegates.

I have worked in Knowledge Exchange (KE) for most of my professional life and have focused on business/university engagements taking place in the UK North West. Placing KE in an international context adds layers of complexities and brings with it a host of new challenges. In the UK we take for granted our sector’s support for KE activity and academic drive for impact. We have stable and robust funding streams from our government and a variety of other agencies. We also have a reliable economy and (until recently…) predictable trading patterns. The context across Africa can be quite different and our methods often simply don’t work in this setting. In Botswana we worked together to apply shared experiences to find ways of working together and allow KE to take place across different environments.

Though they are the least responsible, climate change disproportionately affects developing countries. African nations are responsible for less than 3% of global emissions, but the continent is set to be the worst affected by the devastating impacts of climate change (UK Department for International Development). The continent is getting warmer and rainfall becoming less predictable. As the effects of climate change substantiate, future conflicts will be around fundamental resources, such as access to water. I learnt from colleagues that this is already happening in parts of Africa.

Climate change clearly presents many challenges, but it also brings real opportunity. The UK low carbon economy is estimated to grow 4 times faster than other sectors, delivering between £60 billion and £170 billion of export sales of goods and services by 2030 (UK Clean Growth Strategy).

It was fascinating to discuss with colleagues how we can learn to adapt and change our expectations of how we will live in the future. Perhaps after all we’ve been through in 2020 this seems more within our reach than ever.

Unfortunately, due to Covid-19 our African colleagues were unable to visit Lancaster later in 2020. However, online networking and collaboration is still taking place. The RECIRCULATE project is pleased to report that it has saved in excess of 50 tonnes of carbon by holding its annual meeting online instead of in Benin City, Nigeria. This is the equivalent to that emitted by an average petrol car travelling 7.6 times around the equator.

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