On 21 June 2026, Grand Challenges Canada and Science for Africa Foundation convened a global consortium of partners to London. Together, they announced a new call to “invest in bold, locally led solutions that help health systems anticipate and respond to climate-driven health threats”. Here are seven notable quotes we wrote down during the event.
1. On rooting solutions in the people they serve, and why African governments joined at the start
“It’s a model that is locally led, locally and globally connected. Solutions are most effective when they are rooted in the realities and priorities of the people they intend to serve. For Africa, climate resilience and health resilience are now inseparable. Solutions are most effective when they are rooted in the realities and priorities of the people they intend to serve… Countries have made that commitment to join Nexa at the outset – not in the middle when things have already rolled out, but at the very beginning. They want to be part and parcel of this.” – Dr Tom Kariuki, CEO, Science for Africa Foundation
2. On what a heat wave really means – and why communities must be involved
“You call it a heat wave. In Botswana we’re talking about 45 or 49 degrees Celsius. Right now, if you don’t involve the communities, we’re going to get a shock of our life.” – H.E. Shimane Lawrence Kelaotswe, High Commissioner of Botswana to the United Kingdom
3. On the responsibility that local self-reliance creates
“We found not dozens but hundreds of local solutions, self-funded by the communities themselves. There needs to be a commensurate investment in local action. Otherwise, the risk is that we may find ourselves with better policy, better science… and 5, 10, or 15 years down the line, communities could reject both.” – Reda Sadki, The Geneva Learning Foundation (TGLF)
4. On the generation that pays the price
“The generation that destroys the environment is not the generation that pays the price.” – Wangari Maathai, quoted by Dr Tom Kariuki, Science for Africa Foundation
5. Hope, peace, and proximity: on who bears the cost of a crisis they did not cause
“Half a million people in London will never ever be able to breathe the full capacity of their lungs because of a crisis that they didn’t cause in the first place. It always seems impossible until it’s done. Cities are cutting carbon emissions five times faster than the national average, because we know our residents much closer in a way that governments don’t.” – Mete Coban MBE, Deputy Mayor of London for Environment and Energy
6. On what the panel concluded
“Local knowledge is not simply complementary. It’s essential. We have to understand it and integrate it.” – Doris Wangari, Africa Science Foundation, panel moderator
7. On the mission of Nexa
“That’s how we can move the needle on the climate crisis: by connecting the global and the local, and meeting our most urgent needs.” – Dr Karlee Silver, CEO, Grand Challenges Canada