ABU DHABI // A version of a renowned conference that has included such high-profile speakers as Bono, Bill Gates, Al Gore and the Nobel Prize-winning American physicist Murray Gell-Mann is making its way to Dubai this year.
TEDxDubai, affiliated with the Technology, Entertainment and Design (TED) talks held annually in California, will take place in October after receiving the green light from its US headquarters.
"The buzz is amazing. It's like Woodstock in the 1960s," said Giorgio Ungania, a marketing and new media manager with the Australian firm SAE, who is organising the event with James Piecowye, a professor at Zayed University.
"It gives me a real [sense] of the hunger in the UAE about ideas and forward thinking."
TED has emerged as one of the world's most prestigious conferences after beginning more than 20 years ago as an informal gathering of bankers and architects on the US's west coast. Since then, it has garnered a reputation for attracting the world's leading thinkers and doers to share their thoughts on global issues.
TED's profile has been driven in part by its strict stance on admitting no more than 1,000 people to the audience on an invitation-only basis - there is a three-year waiting list to attend - while broadcasting its 400 talks on the internet, with more than 100 million unique page views.
Bill Gates made headlines when he spoke at TED this year and unleashed a swarm of mosquitoes into the crowd during his talk on malaria.
"Not only poor people should experience this," he told the shocked audience.
While it is too soon to tell if TEDxDubai will share similar theatrics, Mr Ungania is keen to bring the same attention to the UAE.
TEDxDubai last week announced its first speaker, the consumer technology guru and one of the world's most popular podcasters, Leo Laporte.
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The candidates
Dr Ayham Ammora, scientist and business executive
Ali Azeem, business leader
Tony Booth, professor of education
Lord Browne, former BP chief executive
Dr Mohamed El-Erian, economist
Professor Wyn Evans, astrophysicist
Dr Mark Mann, scientist
Gina MIller, anti-Brexit campaigner
Lord Smith, former Cabinet minister
Sandi Toksvig, broadcaster
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
Jordan cabinet changes
In
- Raed Mozafar Abu Al Saoud, Minister of Water and Irrigation
- Dr Bassam Samir Al Talhouni, Minister of Justice
- Majd Mohamed Shoueikeh, State Minister of Development of Foundation Performance
- Azmi Mahmud Mohafaza, Minister of Education and Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research
- Falah Abdalla Al Ammoush, Minister of Public Works and Housing
- Basma Moussa Ishakat, Minister of Social Development
- Dr Ghazi Monawar Al Zein, Minister of Health
- Ibrahim Sobhi Alshahahede, Minister of Agriculture and Minister of Environment
- Dr Mohamed Suleiman Aburamman, Minister of Culture and Minister of Youth
Out
- Dr Adel Issa Al Tawissi, Minister of High Education and Scientific Research
- Hala Noaman “Basiso Lattouf”, Minister of Social Development
- Dr Mahmud Yassin Al Sheyab, Minister of Health
- Yahya Moussa Kasbi, Minister of Public Works and Housing
- Nayef Hamidi Al Fayez, Minister of Environment
- Majd Mohamed Shoueika, Minister of Public Sector Development
- Khalid Moussa Al Huneifat, Minister of Agriculture
- Dr Awad Abu Jarad Al Mushakiba, Minister of Justice
- Mounir Moussa Ouwais, Minister of Water and Agriculture
- Dr Azmi Mahmud Mohafaza, Minister of Education
- Mokarram Mustafa Al Kaysi, Minister of Youth
- Basma Mohamed Al Nousour, Minister of Culture
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MATCH INFO
Liverpool 4 (Salah (pen 4, 33', & pen 88', Van Dijk (20')
Leeds United 3 (Harrison 12', Bamford 30', Klich 66')
Man of the match Mohamed Salah (Liverpool)
