As a child growing up in Nigeria, books sparked my earliest imagination, but films, films transported me to magical places with flying cars, to infinite space with whole universes of worlds to discover. And my journey of discovery has led to many places and possibilities, all linked with ideas and imagination.
我在奈及利亞長大, 書籍引發了我最早的想像; 但是電影,電影將我 帶到了有飛行汽車的神奇地方, 去到能夠發現整個宇宙 無限空間的世界。 而我的發現之旅 帶來許多地方和可能性, 都與想法和想像力相關。
A decade and a half ago, I moved from working in law and technology in New York to financing, producing and distributing films in Nairobi, Lagos and Johannesburg. I've been privileged to see firsthand how in Africa, film powerfully explores the marvelous and the mundane, how it conveys infinite possibilities and fundamental truths. Afrofuturist films like "Pumzi," Wanuri Kahiu's superb sci-fi flick, paint brilliant pictures of Africa's future, while Rungano Nyoni's "I Am Not A Witch" and Akin Omotoso's "Vaya" show us and catalogue our present. These filmmakers offer nuanced snapshots of Africa's imagined and lived reality, in contrast to some of the images of Africa that come from outside, and the perspectives that accompany all of these images, whether sympathetic or dismissive, shape or distort how people see Africa.
十年半前, 我從紐約的法律和技術工作 轉為籌資、製作和發行電影, 地點在奈洛比、拉哥斯和約翰尼斯堡。 我很榮幸能夠親眼目睹非洲的情況, 目睹電影有力地探索了 奇妙而平凡的世界, 和它如何傳達 無限的可能和基本的真理。 非洲的科幻電影,像 《Pumzi》, 是萬努里·卡希 (Wanuri Kahiu) 執導的精湛科幻電影, 描繪非洲未來的精彩畫面; 而倫加諾·尼奧尼(Rungano Nyoni) 執導的《你才女巫,你全家都女巫》, 和阿金-奧莫托索 (Akin Omotoso) 的《Vaya》, 向我們展示、編列了現在。 這些電影製作者提供了非洲的 想像和生活現實的微妙快照, 與來自外部的一些非洲圖像 形成鮮明的對比; 伴隨著所有圖像的觀點, 無論是同情或是不屑, 形塑或扭曲了人們如何看待非洲。
And the truth is, many people think Africa is screwed up. Images play a big part of the reason why. Many tropes about Africa persist from pictures, pictures of famine in Ethiopia 30 years ago, pictures of the Biafran war half a century ago. But on a continent where the average age is 17, these tragic events seem almost prehistoric. Their images are far removed from how people in Africa's many countries see themselves and their neighbors. For them, these images do not represent their reality.
事實是 很多人認為非洲被搞砸了。 很大的原因是非洲的圖像。 許多老圖片依然表達著 對非洲的觀點, 像是 30 年前伊索比亞的 一些飢荒照片, 半個世紀前比亞夫蘭戰爭的圖片。 但在平均年齡為 17 歲的 非洲大陸上, 這些悲慘事件幾乎像是史前時期。 那些圖像與非洲許多國家的人們 看待自己和鄰居的方式天差地遠。 對他們來說,這些圖像 不代表他們的現實。
So what is Africa's reality, or rather, which of Africa's many realities do we choose to focus on? Do we accept Emmanuel Macron's imagination of Africa in 2017 as a place in which all women have seven or eight children? Or do we instead rely on the UN's account that only one of Africa's 54 countries has a fertility rate as high as seven? Do we focus on the fact that infant mortality and life expectancy in Africa today is roughly comparable to the US a hundred years ago, or do we focus on progress, the fact that Africa has cut infant mortality in half in the last four decades and has raised life expectancy by 10 years since the year 2000? These dueling perspectives are all accurate. Well, aside from Macron's. He's just wrong.
那麼非洲的現實是什麼? 或者說,在那麼多的非洲現實中, 我們要選擇關注哪一個? 我們是否接受(法國總統)馬克宏 對 2017 年非洲的想像── 非洲是個所有女人 都生七八個孩子的地方? 或者,我們信賴聯合國的報告, 說非洲 54 個國家中 只有一個的生育率高達七個? 我們是否專注於 今天非洲的嬰兒死亡率和預期壽命 與一百年前的美國大致相當的事實; 還是我們關注於進步, 在過去的四十年中, 非洲已經將嬰兒的死亡率砍半, 相較於 2000 年, 還把平均餘命提高了 10 年? 這些互相比鬥的觀點都正確, 除了馬克宏的。他錯了。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
But one version makes it easy to dismiss Africa as hopeless, while the other fuels hope that a billion people can continue to make progress towards prosperity. The fact that Africans do not have the luxury of turning their gaze elsewhere, the fact that we must make progress or live with the consequence of failure, are the reason we must continue to tell our own stories and show our own images, with honesty and primarily to an African audience, because the image that matters most is the image of Africa in African imaginations.
但一個版本容易視非洲為毫無希望, 而另一個版本則賦予希望, 十億人能夠繼續繁榮發展。 事實上非洲人 沒有把注意力轉向別處的奢望。 我們必須取得進展, 要不然就得接受失敗, 這是我們必須繼續講述自己的故事 並展示自己的形象的原因, 誠實展示,主要針對非洲的觀眾, 因為最重要的形象 是非洲在非洲人心目中的形象。
Now, honesty requires that we acknowledge that Africa is behind the rest of the world and needs to move swiftly to catch up. But thinking of a way forward, I'd like us to engage in a thought exercise. What if we could go back a hundred years, say to the US in 1917, but we could take with us all the modern ideas, innovations, inventions that we have today? What could we achieve with this knowledge? How richly could we improve quality of life and living conditions for people? How widely could we spread prosperity? Imagine if a hundred years ago, the education system had all the knowledge we have today, including how best to teach. And doctors and scientists knew all we do about public health measures, surgery techniques, DNA sequencing, cancer research and treatment? If we had access then to modern semiconductors, computers, mobile devices, the internet? Just imagine. If we did, we could take a quantum leap forward, couldn't we. Well, Africa can take a leap of that magnitude today. There's enough untapped innovation to move Africa a century forward in living conditions if the will and commitment is there.
現在,誠實要求我們承認 非洲落後於世界其他地區, 需要迅速趕上。 但想著前進的方向, 我希望我們參與思考的過程。 假如我們可以回溯一百年, 在 1917 年對美國說, 但是我們能帶著 我們今天所有的現代觀念、 創新和發明,會如何呢? 我們能用這些知識做些什麼? 我們能把人們的生活質量、 生活條件提到多高、多豐富呢? 我們可以在多大程度上推廣繁榮? 想像如果一百年前, 教育系統有今天所有的知識, 明白如何教得最好; 醫生和科學家們 知道所有現代的公共衛生措施、 手術技巧、DNA 測序、 癌症的研究和治療,那會如何? 如果當時我們能接觸到 現代的半導體、 電腦、移動設備、互聯網呢? 就只想像一下。 如果那樣,我們能 向前邁進一大步,不是嗎? 今天的非洲可以大步地躍進, 有足夠多尚未開發的創新 可將非洲的生活條件 向前推進一個世紀, 如果我們下決心許諾,
This is not just a possibility; it's an imperative for Africa's future, a future that will see Africa's population double to two and a half billion people in just three decades, a future that will see Africa have the world's largest workforce, just as the idea of work itself is being radically reconsidered.
這不僅可能,且非洲未來勢在必行。 未來非洲人口將在短短三十年內 倍增至二十五億人; 未來非洲將擁有世界最大的勞動力; 就像工作理念本身 正被徹底重新思考一樣。
Now taking the leap forward isn't that far-fetched. There are tons of examples that demonstrate the potential for change in Africa. Just 20 years ago, Nigeria had fewer than half a million working phone lines. Today it has a hundred million mobile phone subscriptions, and this mobile miracle is mirrored in every African country. There are over three quarters of a billion mobile phones in use in Africa today, and this has spurred justified excitement about leapfrogging, about bringing the sharing economy, artificial intelligence, autonomous machines to Africa. And this is all promising, but we need to think about sequencing. Forget putting the cart before the horse. You can't put the self-driving car before the roads.
現在向前邁進並不是那麼遙不可及, 有大量例子證明非洲變革的潛力。 僅僅 20 年前, 奈及利亞可用的電話線 不到五十萬條, 今天有一億名手機用戶。 而這個移動的奇蹟 反映在每個非洲國家, 今天在非洲使用的手機 超過七億五千萬支, 對飛躍式發展振奮是合理的, 把共享經濟、人工智能、 自動化機器帶到非洲發展。 這一切都很有希望, 但我們需要考慮次序。 不能把馬車放在馬的前面。 你不能沒有道路 就要發展自動駕駛汽車。
(Applause)
(掌聲)
There's a whole infrastructural and logical layer to innovation that we take for granted, but we have to triage for Africa, because some of the biggest infrastructure gaps are for things that are so basic that Westerners rarely have to think about them.
整個基礎設施和邏輯層面的創新 我們視為理所當然; 但我們必須依照 對非洲的緊要程度來分配, 因為有些大型基礎設施的欠缺 非常的基本, 以至西方人幾乎用不著考慮它們。
So let's explore this. Imagine your internet access went off for a day, and when it came back, it only stayed on for three hours at a time, with random 15-hour outages? How would your life change? Now replace internet access with electricity. Think of your fridges, your TVs, your microwaves, just sitting idly for days. Now extend this nightmare to government offices, to businesses, to schools, to hospitals. This, or worse, is the type of access that hundreds of millions of Africans have to electricity, and to water, and to healthcare, and to sanitation, and to education. We must fix this. We must fix this because ensuring widespread and affordable access to decent infrastructure and services isn't just low-hanging fruit: it's fundamental to achieving the hundred-year leap. And when we fix it, we might find some unexpected benefits.
讓我們來探討一下。 想像你的互聯網斷線了一天, 當它恢復時, 每回只能上線三個小時, 又隨機中斷 15 個小時,會怎樣? 你的生活將如何改變? 互聯網擱一邊,現在思考供電, 想想你的冰箱、電視、微波爐 幾天不能用; 再把這個噩夢延伸到政府辦公室、 企業、學校、 醫院。 這種狀況或者更糟的情況, 是數億的非洲人 沒電、 沒水、 沒醫療保健、 沒衛生設施、 沒教育。 我們必須解決此問題。 我們必須解決此問題, 因為確保能夠獲取廣泛、負擔得起、 像樣的基礎設施和服務, 不僅是低垂的果實, (註:可輕易實現的目標) 而且是實現百年飛躍的基礎。 解決它時, 我們可能會發現 一些意想不到的好處。
One unexpected benefit of the mobile miracle was that it led to what is perhaps the greatest cultural resurgence that Africa has seen in a generation: the rebirth of African popular music. For musicians like P-Square, Bongo Maffin and Wizkid, mobile phones paved the path to local dominance and global stardom. And the impact isn't limited just to music. It extends to film, too. Beautiful, engaging films like these stills of "Pumzi," "Vaya," and "I Am Not A Witch" show. For while its external image might be dated, Africa continues to evolve, as does African film. Now, every now and again, the rest of the world catches on, perhaps with Djo Munga's hard-hitting "Viva Riva!" with Newton Aduaka's intense "Ezra," or with Abderrahmane Sissako's poetic "Timbuktu." With mobile, Africans are discovering more and more of these films, and what that means is that it really matters less in Kinshasa or Cotonou what Cannes thinks of African film, or if those opinions are informed or fair.
一個移動奇蹟意想不到的好處 是它導致非洲這一代人 看到最偉大的文化復興: 非洲流行音樂的重生。 對於像 P-Square、 邦戈馬芬 (Bongo Maffin) 和 Wizkid 這樣的音樂人來說, 手機為他們鋪平了稱霸當地 和全球出名的道路。 影響不僅限於音樂, 也延伸到電影。 美麗、迷人的電影, 像《Pumzi》、 《Vaya》和《你才女巫,你全家都女巫》。 儘管非洲的外部形象可能過時, 但非洲仍在繼續演變, 非洲的電影也是。 每隔一段時間, 世界其他各地追趕上來, 也許是道·格蒙加 (Djo Munga) 的強片 《Viva Riva!》, 牛頓·阿杜卡 (Newton Aduaka) 的 戰爭片 《Ezra》, 或阿伯德拉馬納·希薩柯 (Abderrahmane Sissako) 詩意的《Timbuktu》。 有了手機,非洲人越來越看得到 這些電影,也就意味著 對於住在金夏沙或柯多努的人而言, (註:剛果的首都和貝南的大城) 坎城影展對非洲電影的看法, 他們的看法是否公平, 或者他們在不在狀況內並不重要。
Who really cares what the "New York Times" thinks? What matters is that Africans are validating African art and ideas, both critically and commercially, that they are watching what they want, and that African filmmakers are connecting with their core audiences. And this is important. It's important because film can illuminate and inspire. Film can bring visions of the future to us here in the present. Films can serve as a conveyor belt for hope. And film can change perspectives faster than we can build roads.
誰管《紐約時報》怎麼寫? 重要的是,非洲人 正驗證著非洲的藝術和想法, 批判性和商業性地驗證; 他們看他們想要看的電影, 而非洲電影製片人 與核心觀眾聯繫在一起。 這很重要。 這很重要,因為電影能照亮和啟發, 電影能為我們的今天 帶來未來的願景。 電影可以充當希望的傳送帶, 電影改變視角的速度 能比我們開路還要快。
In just over a decade, Nigeria's film industry, Africa's largest, has taken the country's words and languages into the vocabulary and imaginations of millions in many other African countries. It has torn down borders, perhaps in the most effective way since the Berlin Conference sowed linguistic and geographic division across Africa. Film does speak a universal language, and boy, Nigerian film speaks it loudly.
十多年來, 奈及利亞的電影業 是非洲最大的電影產業, 它將該國的文字和語言 帶入許多非洲其他國家 數百萬人的詞彙和想像中。 它已經拆除了邊界, 也許是自柏林會議以來 最有效的方式, 散播在非洲各語言和地理的區域裡。 電影講的確實是一種普遍的語言, 奈及利亞的電影大聲說話。
Making Africa's hundred-year leap will require that Africans summon the creativity to generate ideas and find the openness to accept and adapt ideas from anywhere else in the world to solve our pervasive problems. With focus on investment, films can help drive that change in Africa's people, a change that is necessary to make the hundred-year leap, a change that will help create a prosperous Africa, an Africa that is dramatically better than it is today.
要實現非洲的百年跨越 需要非洲人喚起創造力、產生想法, 以開放的態度接受和調整 來自世界各地的想法, 解決我們普遍存在的問題。 以投資為重點, 電影可以幫助推動非洲人民的變化, 這是實現百年跨越的必要變革, 這變化將有助於創造繁榮的非洲, 造出遠比現在好得多的非洲。
Thank you.
謝謝。
Asante sana.
Asante sana (謝謝)。
(Applause)
(掌聲)