Cotonou, Benin
CNN
 — 

Standing on the stony ground in the bustling Fifa Park car lot, Rokeeb Yaya is haggling over the price of a dark red car. It is one of a couple hundred vehicles, parked in long lines stretching out across the vast lot – some shiny and new-looking, others dented and dusty.

The car Yaya has his eye on, a 2008 US-built Ford Escape, is on sale for around $4,000. It’s relatively affordable – US cars are cheaper than most other brands in the lot – and he wants to upgrade from his motorbike to a car. He is not interested in the history of the vehicle, he said, only that he can afford it.

But how this Ford ended up here – in one of the biggest car lots in the port city of Cotonou – helps tell a bigger story about how many of the West’s gas-guzzling cars are starting second lives in West Africa.

The 14-year old Ford arrived in Benin from the United States last year, after being sold at an auto auction.

Car records reviewed by CNN show it had three previous owners in Virginia and Maryland, and has logged over 252,000 miles on the road. It had one previous recall for its power steering, but unlike some of the other cars on the lot, it arrived in a relatively sound condition – it hadn’t been in any reported accidents.

This aging SUV is just one of millions of used cars that arrive every year in West Africa from wealthy countries such as Japan, South Korea, European countries and, increasingly, the US. Many of these end up in Benin, one of Africa’s top importers of used vehicles.

The stream of used cars heading to West African ports is only expected to increase with the West’s shift to electric vehicles. As wealthy countries set aggressive goals to move consumers towards electric vehicles to cut planet-warming pollution, gas-powered cars won’t necessarily go away.

Instead, many will be shipped thousands of miles away to developing countries like Benin, where populations are growing, along with demand for used cars.

Experts say the effect will be to divert climate and environmental problems to countries that are the most vulnerable to the climate crisis, undermining their own attempts to cut planet-warming pollution.

Exploding demand

The global market for used light-duty vehicles grew nearly 20% from 2015 to 2019, when more than 4.8 million were exported. There was a slight dip in exports in 2020 when the Covid pandemic started, but numbers are now “growing quite rapidly,” United Nations Environment Programme official Rob de Jong told CNN.

The US exports about 18% of the world’s used vehicles, according to UNEP data. These travel all over the globe, including to the Middle East and Central America, but many go to Nigeria, Benin and Ghana.

Some of these are salvaged cars that have been in accidents, were flooded, or are just too old – which get auctioned off for parts. Others are whole used cars that US car dealers are looking to offload.

“A lot of them are going to be two- to five-year-old Hyundais, Toyotas, sedans,” said Dmitriy Shibarshin, marketing director for West Coast Shipping, a company that specializes in shipping cars internationally. “It’s mostly the economy cars that get shipped there.”

Shibarshin’s company and others are “like FedEx” for cars, he said. His company usually specializes in higher-end vehicles, but also ships cheaper cars.

In major African countries like Kenya and Nigeria, more than 90% of the cars and trucks are used vehicles from overseas. In Kenya, where de Jong is based, the vehicle fleet has doubled every eight years; streets that used to be devoid of cars are now jammed with traffic, he said.

There is a tremendous appetite for these used vehicles. “You have a very young population that’s getting richer and richer by the day,” said Etop Ipke, the CEO of Autochek Africa, an online marketplace for cars. “The first thing they want to do, as they can afford things, is some mobility,” he said.

But, unlike in the US, few prospective buyers have access to credit, so new cars are often out of reach.

“That is fundamentally the reason why we’re not able to improve the quality” of cars sold, Ipke said. “It’s not like people want to drive used cars; it’s an affordability issue.”

Experts say demand for used cars could explode further as the take up of electric cars in the West increases the supply of used cars to African countries. Nearly one in five vehicles sold globally this year will be electric, according to the International Energy Agency, compared to less than 5% in 2020. China, Europe and the US are leading the EV market, the agency said.

In states like New York and Florida, where consumers are buying more EVs, dealers are increasingly looking overseas as a place to sell their older gas-powered models, according to Matt Trapp, a regional vice president at the huge auto auction company Manheim.

Those states also have robust port operations, making them an ideal place to ship used cars to Africa. “It’s setting up a really complementary dynamic,” Trapp told CNN.

“I’m not surprised to see how robust the export game is becoming,” Trapp said. “We’re going to see this dynamic more and more. When [auto dealers] see demand in other markets, they will find a way to move the metal there.”

From UNEP’s perspective, not all gas-powered cars are concerning – it’s the older ones, which tend to pollute more and be less safe, De Jong said. There’s evidence that the increasing demand in Africa for vehicles is actually resulting in more old and salvaged cars being shipped to the continent recently than there were 20 years ago.

“What we see at the moment is a wide variety of used vehicles being exported from the global north to the global south,” de Jong said. “Not only is the number increasing, but the quality is decreasing.”

In one section of Fifa Park, CNN finds a 16-year-old Dodge Charger, worn by age.

“We just sold it for 3 million XOF [around $4,500],” its seller, who did not wish to be named, said of the vehicle that arrived in Benin from the US two years ago.

Parked across from the Charger is a 24-year-old Ford Winstar that was shipped to Benin from the US last year. It’s a cheaper alternative for low-income car buyers who cannot afford newer models.

Car dealer Abdul Koura said that US and Canadian cars are very desirable to importers, who often bring in cars that have been in accidents, he told CNN.

“They repair these cars and resell them to make a profit,” said Koura, whose space at Cotonou’s Fifa park includes more than 30 used vehicles imported from Canada.

Victor Ojoh, a Nigerian car dealer who frequents Fifa Park, told CNN that it’s often possible to tell the origin of a car by what’s wrong with it.

“The cars that smoke are mostly from the US,” said Ojoh. “The cars from Canada are mostly flooded cars that start developing electrical faults.”

Some imported vehicles are missing their catalytic converters, an exhaust emission control devices which filter toxic gasses. Catalytic converters contain valuable metals including platinum and can fetch up to $100 on the black market. Some of the cars are shipped without catalytic converters or have them removed by dealers upon arrival, Ojo said.

Millions of cars shipped to Africa and Asia from the US, Europe and Japan are “polluting or unsafe,” according to UNEP. “Often with faulty or missing components, they belch out toxic fumes, increasing air pollution and hindering efforts to fight climate change.”

Regulations aimed at reducing pollution and increasing the safety of imported cars into West Africa have tended to be weak. But attempts have been made recently to tighten them up.

In 2020, Benin and 14 other members of the Economic Community of West African States bloc agreed a set of vehicle emissions regulations in the region, including an age limit of 10 years for used vehicles and limits on the amount of carbon pollution cars are allowed to produce.

But it’s unclear how strictly they are being enforced.

UNEP officials, including de Jong, have also had conversations with US and EU officials about putting in new regulations that would crack down on shipping very old or junk cars to developing nations. Those conversations are in early stages and have yet to result in any commitments.

Still, de Jong said climate change and global emissions have made the conversation around used cars “a different ballgame.” Increased shipments of older and more polluting cars are just as much of a problem for developed nations as they are for the developing countries where they are being driven, he added.

“Today with climate change, it doesn’t really matter where the emissions are taking place,” de Jong said. “Whether in Washington, DC, or Lagos, it makes no difference.”

Ipke doesn’t think that it is inevitable that Africa will accept all the old gas-powered cars the West no longer wants. He hopes that the transition to electric vehicles will come to the African continent as well, although that will require significant improvements to the charging infrastructure.

“In terms of where Africa goes, the transition shouldn’t necessarily be from used cars to brand new combustion engines, it should be from used cars to EVs,” Ipke said. “I think the continent has to be prepared for EVs, used or brand new, because that’s the direction the world is taking.”

For Yaya, however, this all seems a long way off. What brought him to Fifa Park, and to the old Ford SUV, was a lack of other options.

“I can only purchase what my money can afford,” he said.

CNN
 — 

For years, Alli Nansolo grappled with whether to cut his son’s dreadlocks or not. Although it is not a legal requirement in Malawi, an unwritten policy enforced across government schools meant his son was being denied admission because of his hair.

Nansolo’s could not pay for private education for his son Ishmael from his modest dressmaking income and cutting his hair, an important symbol of their Rastafari religion, was inconceivable to him.

“Rastafari is a spiritual way of life. Keeping dreadlocks is like we are committing ourselves to a vow before the most high creator that we will serve him in our life without denying his laws or commandments,” Nansolo told CNN.

The 48-year-old makes between 200,000 to 300,000 Malawian Kwacha (around $194 to $291) monthly, while his wife Empress supplements the family’s income by selling secondhand clothes.

“I felt oppressed,” Nansolo said as he recalled the staff of a state-run secondary school in Zomba, southern Malawi. refusing to register Ishmael because of his hair.

Nansolo said he contacted an officer at the Ministry of Education who advised him to cut his son’s hair so that he could go to school.

Nansolo found himself caught up in the discriminatory policies of Malawian public schools and decided to take legal action against the Ministry of Education, along with a group of parents.

“I went to the Women Lawyers Association of Malawi to ask for help. The association accepted and we went to court in November 2017,” he said.

For three years, Ishmael, then 15, would remain out of school as the court case dragged on.

Then, in 2020, the Malawi High Court placed an interim order compelling public schools to enroll Ishmael and other Rastafari children until a final ruling was reached.

It was a legal victory that marked a significant milestone for the estimated 15,000 Rastafarian community in Malawi, according to Nansolo, who is also a community elder.

However, the temporary relief did not address the broader issue of discrimination that around 1,200 affected students face, their lawyer Chikondi Chijozi told CNN.

“We saw a number of Rastafari children being admitted into government schools but there were still reported cases of children of [the] Rastafari community being denied admission into government schools, and their parents were forced to take the court injunction to the school to compel them to admit them,” Chijozi said.

‘Free’ at last, but challenges remain

After a six-year legal challenge, the Malawian High Court delivered a landmark ruling on May 8.

The court ruled that it was unlawful to require learners, including Rastafarian kids, to cut their hair before they are enrolled into public schools.

The ruling came into immediate effect but the government has until June 30 to issue a nationwide statement mandating acceptance of all dreadlocked children into school.

Chijoki told CNN: “We got a judgment from the court which essentially upheld the rights of the Rastafari children and abolished the policy that requires all learners, including Rastafari children, to cut off their dreadlocks for them to be admitted into government schools.”

Nansolo expressed his community’s jubilation that their children could now finally continue their education.

“The judgment means that we are now free because most of us in [the] Rastafarian community don’t earn much, so we couldn’t manage to send our children to private schools,” Nansolo said.

“We are happy seeing that our children will now be going to public schools without being sent back or denied their right to education.”

CNN has contacted the education ministry for comment on the ruling.

Despite this victory, Malawi’s Rastafarian community still faces numerous challenges. Unemployment, poverty, and corporate discrimination persistently plague the community. Data on the community is hard to come by but the US State Department says around 5.6 percent of Malawi’s nearly 21 million population is formed of other religions including Hindus, Baha’is, Rastafarians, Jews, and Sikhs.

“Most of us rely on business to survive. Lack of jobs is a big challenge for the Rastafarian community because those in offices are reluctant to employ Rastas,” Nansolo said.

“The corporate world feels that being Rastafari is associated with criminality, but we are not like that.”

CNN
 — 

Before music streaming was popular, Nigerian group P-Square was already among the pioneers of the sound now dubbed Afrobeats.

Twin brothers Paul and Peter Okoye have experienced both highs and lows since their 2003 debut, including six studio albums and collaborations with some of the biggest names in the industry, such as Rick Ross, T.I., Akon, and Tiwa Savage.

Yet the pair went their separate ways, breaking up P-Square in 2017 to pursue solo music careers behind their pseudonyms RudeBoy (Paul) and Mr. P. (Peter) – the latter also dipping his toes into acting in the 2018 drama, Genevieve Nnaji’s “Lionheart,” and more recently in the Netflix original “Shanty Town.”

Read more: ‘This is a dream’: Burna Boy, Afrobeats stars take center stage at NBA All-Star Game

“Anything you see that happens to a (music) group, it’s the same thing that happened to us,” Paul Okoye told CNN’s Larry Madowo during a recent interview in Lagos. “Irrespective of how people want to look at it, we felt the fans were disappointed,” he added. “We’re humans. It’s normal.”

Now, P-Square is back together and producing their first album in nine years, vowing a 2023 release date. After reuniting last August, they released the single “Jaiye (Ihe Geme)” to promote their “100 Cities World Tour,” starting with North America and continuing through Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa later this year.

Watch the video at the top of this page to hear more from Larry Madowo’s conversation with P-Square in their Lagos studio.

Johannesburg
CNN
 — 

The most wanted fugitive in the Rwandan genocide of 1994 has been arrested in Paarl, South Africa after decades on the run.

Fulgence Kayishema is accused of orchestrating the killing of more than 2,000 Tutsi refugees – women, men, children and the elderly – at Nyange Catholic Church during the genocide. He has been on the run since 2001.

He was captured Wednesday in a joint operation between the South African authorities and UN investigators.

When he was arrested, Kayishema initially denied his identity, according to a statement from the UN team. But by the end of the evening he told them: “I have been waiting a long time to be arrested.”

Investigators said he used multiple identities and forged documents to evade detection.

“The arrest was the culmination of an intense, thorough and rigorous investigation,” a senior official at the prosecutor’s office involved in the case told CNN.

“Family members and known associates were exhaustively investigated. That ultimately led to identifying the right location to search and finding the critical intelligence that was needed.”

“Fulgence Kayishema was a fugitive for more than 20 years. His arrest ensures that he will finally face justice for his alleged crimes,” said Chief Prosecutor Serge Brammertz of the United Nations’ International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT).

“Genocide is the most serious crime known to humankind. The international community has committed to ensure that its perpetrators will be prosecuted and punished. This arrest is a tangible demonstration that this commitment does not fade and that justice will be done, no matter how long it takes,” Brammertz said.

At the end of the genocide in July 1994, Kayishema fled to the Democratic Republic of Congo with his wife, children and brother-in-law. After relocating to other African countries, he moved to South Africa in 1999 and claimed asylum in Cape Town, using a false name.

According to prosecutors, since his arrival in South Africa he was able to rely on a tight support network including former Rwandan military members which went to extreme lengths to conceal his activities and whereabouts.

In recent years, the IRMCT prosecutor has complained about the lack of cooperation from South African authorities and there have been a series of near misses capturing Kayishema. A report describes a failure to arrest Kayishema three years ago.

But on Thursday, Brammertz lauded the cooperation and support of the South African government.

The events in Nyanga, Rwanda, were one of the most brutal of the genocide, in which an estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed over the period of 90 days.

The tribunal alleges that Kayishema directly participated in the “planning and execution of this massacre.” The indictment says he bought and distributed petrol to burn down the church while refugees were inside. Kayishema and others are also accused of using a bulldozer to collapse the church following the fire, while refugees were still inside.

The former priest at the church, Athanase Seromba, was convicted over the massacre in 2006 and sentenced to 15 years in prison, which was later increased to a life sentence on appeal.

Kayishema is due to be arraigned on Friday in a Cape Town court.

A reward of up to $5,000,000 was offered by the US War Crimes Rewards Program for information on Kayishema and the other fugitives wanted for perpetrating the Rwandan genocide.

With the arrest of Kayishema, the UN is still seeking three more prominent suspects.

In 2020, another fugitive was captured in a Paris suburb after more than 20 years on the run.

Félicien Kabuga, “one of the world’s most wanted fugitives,” who is alleged to have been a leading figure in the genocide, was arrested in a joint operation with French authorities.

The Rwandan genocide saw Hutu militias and civilians alike murder vast numbers of members of the Tutsi ethnic minority: men, women and children, many of whom had been their neighbors before the conflict began.

The killings finally came to an end 100 days later, when Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) troops, led by Paul Kagame, defeated the Hutu rebels and took control of the country.

“The fact that I am single was another reason for the bullying with many saying that it was the reason I got the position,” insinuating that she had used sex to get ahead, Nyanjura tells CNN. People will say “I am not responsible because I am not married,” she says. And if they ever saw her with a man, even just standing next to one, “they would want to make it an issue.”

The 33-year-old politician, who was a student activist at Makerere University in Kampala before entering into politics in 2016 and joining the Forum for Democratic change (FDC), one of Uganda’s main opposition parties, says that the harassment she gets on social media and messaging platforms is worse when she advocates for gender equality.

“Many feel advocating for equity and equality is an abuse of culture and religious beliefs. For all my posts advocating for gender equity, I receive abuse or insults,” Nyanjura explains, adding that her advocacy posts on social media usually get lifted and shared across several WhatsApp groups, followed by abuse on all platforms.

Nyanjura goes on: threats of “physical attacks happen when I am planning a demonstration and posting about them on social media … I get threats of being arrested or being carried in a ‘drone’ (a nickname given to the vans that have reportedly been used in arrests of political activists in Uganda). So, I stay away from my home at such times and ask my family members to do the same,” she told CNN.

At first, the abuse made her feel awful, she says, but aware that her abusers want to silence her Nyanjura tells CNN that she’s decided to stand her ground and be a positive example for other women in public life.

“There are so many women who are not on any of these media platforms (but) if I am to go off social media because I have been bullied, what example am I creating for other women that are following me, my posts, my videos and pick encouragement from me?”

One in two Ugandan women in public life targeted

Recent surveys in Uganda have revealed stark numbers highlighting how common it is for women to be targeted online.

“Many of them stopped using the apps and stopped organizing online,” says Irene Mwendwa, Director of Strategic Initiatives at Pollicy.

The report, the second by the IPU, following one in 2018 on European parliaments, found that in comparison “online attacks are also common but lower than in Europe,” attributing the difference to “greater disparities in women’s access to the internet between the two regions.”

When Olive Namazzi decided to go into politics, she believed she would have a rewarding public life. But Namazzi, who, like Nyanjura, is 34 and in the FDC, says she hadn’t realized that stepping into the political arena as a woman — and one with a disability — would kick off a campaign of cyberbullying that would last for more than a decade. 

As part of its commitments, the FDC prioritizes women’s empowerment. In her role overseeing health, education, environment and sports for the Kampala City Council, Namazzi says social media is a vital tool to help make her work in the community visible and to build voter support. But it is also a space she says she must defend herself against a torrent of abuse.

Speaking on why women politicians and public figures experience more cyberbullying than their male colleagues, Namazzi tells CNN: “People find us easy targets. Once you are a woman who is known, you are a likely candidate for bullying.”

An accident in 2013 left her with a limp, for which she wears specially made shoes. For her detractors, this is something to mock. She described an exchange in a WhatsApp group she’s in: “I was trying to reason somebody out intellectually and then somebody (else) came and started abusing me that I put on shoes that are not balancing. He started telling me about how I can’t balance when I am walking,” Namazzi says. “It was below the belt.”

In another WhatsApp group, this time a private group chat with other politicians, Namazzi says remarks were made about the age at which she got married and started a family. “What I find interesting is that sometimes these abuses are from our very colleagues who are educated and whom we expect to understand us,” she says, adding: “This is on a platform of leaders. It was very bad.”

Namazzi and Nyanjura’s experiences are supported by the IPU and APU’s 2021 research, which found that the majority of abuse women parliamentarians face, comes from their male peers, especially those from rival parties. The report also found that women parliamentarians who live with disabilities as well as those who are unmarried, under 40, and from minority groups, suffer more violence. As Nyanjura’s account shows, women MPs who promote women’s rights and gender equality are also targeted, the report found.

Systems Error

A law in place for over a decade

This online abuse of women politicians is happening in a country that has had a cybersecurity law in place for more than a decade.

Uganda’s Computer Misuse Act initially prohibited offensive communication and cyber harassment and was amended in 2022 to add hate speech to the list. The offensive communication part was ruled unconstitutional earlier this year, but cyber harassment is punishable by a fine of “up to seven hundred and fifty currency points” or imprisonment up to seven years, or both.

This “undermines the ability and efficacy (of laws) as tools against cybercrime,” says Eron Kiiza, a human rights lawyer and member of the Uganda Law Society Rule of Law Committee. Kiiza adds that cyber laws are typically “vaguely drafted and prone to legal challenges,” which “brings problems when cases are taken to court.”

Multiple legal and women’s right’s experts told CNN that the challenges with using the law to successfully prosecute online harassment results in women deciding not to report abuses to the relevant authorities.

For Namazzi, the police are of no help, she says. “Authorities do not consider online bullying to be as serious as physical bullying and therefore do not treat it with the severity that it needs,” she tells CNN.

CNN reached out the Uganda Police Force and the Justice Ministry for comment, but they did not respond.

Experts and activists in the country say that better-targeted protections are needed to ensure women stay vocal and visible in Ugandan politics and feel confident sharing their work and views as much as men in the same positions of power.

“We really need the women’s voice to change the way that economies and politics and social policies are made,” says Brigitte Filion, gender equality programme officer for the Inter-Parliamentary Union. “When there are women in parliaments, there is also more laws and policies on issues like violence against women and gender-related issues… It will be a very big loss for society in general if women are not involved equally in politics,” she says.

Learning how to respond to abuse

With laws failing to protect women, civil society organizations like Pollicy have spent years creating national and regional programs to help women protect themselves online.

“Less than a quarter of African national parliamentarians and local government are women,” explains Pollicy’s Mwendwa. “Digital upskilling will enable women politicians to scale up their work, their careers (and) their communities.”

People “weave through the maze of threats which are presented with lessons on how to navigate such threats in real life,” Mwendwa explains.

The game helped Namazzi learn how to respond to her bullies. “It taught me when to ignore and how to block bullies. It guided me on how to report bullying to the platforms where it was happening,” she tells CNN.

Pollicy also runs training events for women policymakers. In February, Mwendwa says 90 women from Uganda, Tanzania and Senegal came together as part of the Vote: Women program. Here, participants were able to share personal experiences as well as get training in digital resilience, combatting online violence and harassment, and engaging safely in public debate. Both Nyanjura and Namazzi attended the event.

“Rather than cower to the bullies, I have chosen to stay on”

Multiple organizations are working with Uganda’s beleaguered women politicians to achieve what they say the laws in place are failing to accomplish, including the Women of Uganda Network (WOUGNET), an NGO that promotes the use of technology among women, girls and women’s rights organizations, formerly run by Peace Oliver Amuge as Executive Director.

WOUGNET, now active for more than 20 years, works with women leaders to not just address their own experiences of abuse but also to better legislate on these issues. Amuge points out that while the hate speech amendment does mention gender, Uganda’s Computer Misuse Act does not specifically cover online gender-based violence, which they are advocating for.

She agrees that online engagement can be an effective tool in politics, but warns that many women are avoiding online platforms for fear of abuse. But Nyanjura and Namazzi are determined to stay engaged and to stay in politics, despite the costs.

“I almost ran mad engaging a bully for two days nonstop,” says Namazzi. “But I was determined to be a politician against the odds of any kind of intimidation…Rather than cower to the bullying, I have chosen to stay on and attack them right back.”

“I want to tell (other women) when you stand up, (harassers) will eventually leave you alone,” says Nyanjura before adding: “If women do not embrace the digital world, they are definitely going to be left behind.”

The Ugandan Ministry of Information and Communication Technology did not respond to any of CNN’s multiple requests for comment.

—-

Credits

Reporting: Adie Vanessa Offiong

Editors: Meera Senthilingam, Eliza Anyangwe

Photography: Esther Ruth Mbabazi

Photo Editor: Will Lanzoni

CNN
 — 

A fashion show that features elderly people as models is a rarity. One with elderly Black African models is even rarer.

Perhaps that’s why Nigerian visual artist Malik Afegbua got so much attention from around the world when he posted images on social media last month showing seniors on a fashion runway, draped in stylish, colorful clothes.

Titled “The Elders Series,” the images challenge stereotypes around how older people are perceived, as well as foregrounding African faces and bodies, which have often been at the periphery of the fashion world.

“The inspiration behind (this series) was my mum,” explained Afegbua, 38. “She had a stroke, and I am very close to my mum. I just needed an outlet to find a way to express myself and not think about her on a life-support machine. I wanted to think about her in a happy place.”

But what’s truly remarkable about the images is that the ground-breaking fashion show never actually took place. While the images look like photographs of a genuine event, they were entirely generated by artificial intelligence (AI).

Twelve years ago, Afegbua was an amateur photographer and visual artist when he received a Canon camera as a gift. He says it gave him the opportunity to start producing videos, and as a self-taught filmmaker he has gone on to create numerous movies and corporate videos. He produced series two and three of Netflix show “Made By Design,” as well as a biopic docudrama on Nigerian designer Nike Davies-Okundaye.

“The Elders Series” is an extension of other projects that Afegbua has created through AI. He uses the AI platform Midjourney, which generates images in response to text prompts. Afegbua says he experiments with different phrases, refining his search terms until he gets an image he likes, and then edits it in Photoshop – repeating the process until he achieves the effect he’s looking for.

“When it comes to AI, you put in a text prompt, it gives you something random – you keep going to different depths until you find what you want,” he said.

There has been much controversy over racial and gender bias in AI. Facial recognition technology can be less accurate for Black skin than White, and AI systems to spot skin cancer have been found to be trained predominantly on White skin. It’s also been noted that AI art platforms can produce pictures that reflect the cultural biases of images found on the internet.

Afegbua said that until his mother’s stroke, he had only worked experimentally with images of Black people on AI platforms, but he found that the images they produced were “mangled up and not very good.”

He noticed that the images produced of Black Americans were different than those of Black Africans. “When you put ‘African’ they look less dapper and in a less nice environment,” Afegbua explained.

Through repeated searches using variations of his text prompts, he says he was able to train the AI and improve the images it produced of Black people. “Now anyone can go into the AI and put ‘a Black man in a fashion show’ and you are going to get something like what I did, because it’s now in the system,” he said. “Because I’ve done it, the system now has that data.”

Afegbua believes AI can be a powerful tool for the arts – film and television in particular. “It’s here to stay … it’s going to evolve and it’s going to get better,” he said. But he says the role of a human creator is still key. “AI is not All. It can’t think by itself, there is always a human being behind it regardless – to put things in motion,” he added.

His other AI projects include creating a virtual futuristic city called “Ngochola,” populated by people who are heroic, beautiful and African. Afegbua says he wanted the city to reflect ancient African civilizations, and “the power that technology would play in that society” if it weren’t for colonialism. But it is “The Elders Series” that has got him the most attention.

Afegbua says that since he shared the images he has been invited to exhibit his work at galleries in the US, France and Brazil, and has signed a deal to work on a Hollywood movie. But perhaps more rewarding is the recognition he’s received for presenting older people in a positive light.

“I’ve had many associations that have to do with the elderly contact me asking how we can collaborate,” he said, adding that the World Health Organization had been in touch to tell him that it views his work as “a major, positive contributor in the global effort by the WHO/UN’s Decade of Healthy Ageing in combatting ageism.”

“I didn’t think it was going to resonate with the world like that,” Afegbua said. “I am glad that people are starting to have that conversation.”

CNN
 — 

Although Nigeria has vast energy reserves, more than 92 million people in the country live without access to electricity, according to the International Energy Agency. Those who are connected to the electricity grid have to contend with frequent power cuts, which cost the country $28 billion a year – almost 2% of its GDP.

As a result, many Nigerians rely on petrol and diesel to fuel the generators that power their homes and businesses.

But generators are noisy, expensive, and pollute the air. Fuel shortages were a key issue in Nigeria’s recent presidential election and have made it increasingly difficult to run generators.

Entrepreneur Olugbenga Olubanjo is offering an alternative. His company Reeddi rents out small, lightweight solar-powered batteries called “Reeddi Capsules” that can power devices including TVs, laptops and refrigerators.

Reeddi was one of the finalists for Prince William’s Earthshot Prize, which recognizes ambitious efforts to fix environmental problems. In a podcast, the Prince of Wales said that “the capsule will have a huge influence on communities where energy poverty is a big deal.”

Olubanjo grew up in Nigeria and says that during his time studying engineering at the University of Ibadan, he often had to work on his assignments while contending with power cuts. As a postgraduate, he studied at the University of Toronto, in Canada. “For the first time in my life, I had access to electricity, and I saw my own productivity quadruple,” Olubanjo said.

Often, when calling family and friends back home, their power would go off, highlighting the energy inequality. “As I had a deep understanding of the community, I felt obliged to do something,” he said.

Reeddi Capsules can be bought along with a solar panel for 199,000 Nigerian Naira (around $430) or rented from “mom-and-pop shops” for 24 hours for around 50 cents, charged using solar panels operated by Reeddi. Olubanjo says one battery can power a TV for around five hours, or a 15-watt fan for 15 hours.

That makes it considerably more expensive than using mains electricity, but it’s often cheaper than running a generator.

Joel Jewell, a trader in Ogun State, says he uses the capsule most days to charge his laptop and phone. Without it, he is forced to rely on his generator during the regular power cuts. “We sometimes don’t (even) get two hours of power supply,” he said. “And Reeddi coming is a kind of an answer to prayer.”

Currently, the batteries are only available in Nigeria, where Olubanjo says they are used by more than 1,600 people, mainly in Lagos and Ogun State. But across the continent, more than 600 million people lack access to electricity, according to the International Energy Agency.

Olubanjo says organizations in countries including Uganda, Ghana and South Africa have expressed an interest in the Reeddi Capsule. “We’re going to try our best to optimize what we have in Nigeria before we scale it to that broader part of Africa,” he said.

Reeddi is not the only company offering battery packs as an alternative to generators. UK-based Mobile Power rents out batteries in countries including Nigeria, Zambia and Ghana.

Anita Otubu, a senior director of Sustainable Energy for All – a UN-affiliated organization that works to improve access to energy – says “companies like Reeddi are key contributors to reducing Nigeria’s access deficit.”

But she adds that if Reeddi is to scale up its business, it will need to make the battery rentals cheaper “or increase the capacity of each system, to enable Nigerians to have value for money when they purchase such systems.”

For Olubanjo, the company’s biggest challenge is keeping up with demand, with each batch of batteries taking three to four months to produce. But he is confident Reeddi can have a wider impact.

“The goal is to make the future (brighter) for a lot of Nigerians and Africans,” he said.

Here’s how to donate to a Top 10 CNN Hero

Anderson Cooper explains how you can easily donate to any of the 2021 Top 10 CNN Heroes.

CNN
 — 

As the US attempts to wean itself off its heavy reliance on fossil fuels and shift to cleaner energy sources, many experts are eyeing a promising solution: your neighborhood big-box stores and shopping malls.

The rooftops and parking lot space available at retail giants like Walmart, Target and Costco is massive. And these largely empty spaces are being touted as untapped potential for solar power that could help the US reduce its dependency on foreign energy, slash planet-warming emissions and save companies millions of dollars in the process.

At the IKEA store in Baltimore, installing solar panels on the roof and over the store’s parking lot cut the amount of energy it needed to purchase by 84%, slashing its costs by 57% from September to December of 2020, according to the company. (The panels also provide some beneficial shade to keep customers’ cars cool on hot, sunny days.)

As of February 2021, IKEA had 54 solar arrays installed across 90% of its US locations.

Big-box stores and shopping centers have enough roof space to produce half of their annual electricity needs from solar, according to a report from nonprofit Environment America and research firm Frontier Group.

Leveraging the full rooftop solar potential of these superstores would generate enough electricity to power nearly 8 million average homes, the report concluded, and would cut the same amount of planet-warming emissions as pulling 11.3 million gas-powered cars off the road.

The average Walmart store, for example, has 180,000 square feet of rooftop, according to the report. That’s roughly the size of three football fields and enough space to support solar energy that could power the equivalent of 200 homes, the report said.

“Every rooftop in America that isn’t producing solar energy is a rooftop wasted as we work to break our dependence on fossil fuels and the geopolitical conflicts that come with them,” Johanna Neumann, senior director for Environment America’s campaign for 100% Renewable, told CNN. “Now is the time to lean into local renewable energy production, and there’s no better place than the roofs of America’s big-box superstores.”

Advocates involved in clean energy worker-training programs tell CNN that a solar revolution in big-box retail would also be a significant windfall for local communities, spurring economic growth while tackling the climate crisis, which has inflicted disproportionate harm on marginalized communities.

Yet only a fraction of big-box stores in the US have solar on their rooftops or solar canopies in parking lots, the report’s authors told CNN.

CNN reached out to five of the top US retailers — Walmart, Kroger, Home Depot, Costco and Target — to ask: Why not invest in more rooftop solar?

Many renewable energy experts point to solar as a relatively simple solution to cut down on costs and help rein in fossil fuel emissions, but the companies point to several roadblocks — regulations, labor costs and structural integrity of the rooftops themselves — that are preventing more widespread adoption.

The need for these kinds of clean energy initiatives is becoming “unquestionably urgent” as the climate crisis accelerates, said Edwin Cowen, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Cornell University.

“We are behind the eight ball, to put it mildly,” Cowen told CNN. “I would have loved to see policy help incentivize rooftop solar 15 years ago instead of five years ago in the commercial space. There’s still a tremendous amount of work to do.”

Neumann said Walmart, the nation’s largest retailer, possesses by far the largest solar potential. Walmart has around 5,000 stores in the US and more than 783 million square feet of rooftop space — an area larger than Manhattan — and more than 8,974 gigawatt hours of annual rooftop solar potential, according to the report.

It’s enough electricity to power more than 842,000 homes, the report said.

Walmart spokesperson Mariel Messier told CNN the company is involved in renewable energy projects around the world, but many of them are not rooftop solar installations. The company has reported having completed on- and off-site wind and solar projects or had others under development with a capacity to produce more than 2.3 gigawatts of renewable energy.

Neumann said Environment America has met with Walmart a few times, urging the retailer to commit to installing solar panels on roofs and in parking lots. The company has said it’s aiming to source 100% of its energy through renewable projects by 2035.

“Of all the retailers in America, Walmart stands to make the biggest impact if they put rooftop solar on all of their stores,” Neumann told CNN. “And for us, this report just underscores just how much of an impact they could make if they make that decision.”

According to Environment America, Walmart had installed almost 194 megawatts of solar capacity on its US facilities as of the end of the 2021 fiscal year and additional capacity in off-site solar farms. The company’s installations in California were expected to provide between 20% to 30% of each location’s electricity needs.

Target ranked No. 1 for on-site solar capacity in 2019, according to industry trade group Solar Energy Industries Association’s most recent report. It currently has 542 locations with rooftop solar — around a quarter of the company’s stores — a Target spokesperson told CNN. Rooftop solar generates enough energy to meet 15% to 40% of Target properties’ energy needs, the spokesperson said.

Richard Galanti, the chief financial officer at Costco, said the company has 121 stores with rooftop solar around the world, 95 of which are in the US.

Walmart, Target and Costco did not share with CNN what their biggest barriers are to adding rooftop or parking lot solar panels to more stores.

“My suspicion is that they want an even stronger business case for deviating from business-as-usual,” Neumann said. “Historically, all those roofs have done is cover their stores, and rethinking how [they] use their buildings and thinking of them as energy generators, not just protection from rain, requires a small change in their business model.”

Home Depot, which has around 2,300 stores, currently has 75 completed rooftop solar projects, 12 in construction and more than 30 planned for future development, said Craig D’Arcy, the company’s director of energy management. Solar power generates around half of these stores’ energy needs on average, he said.

Aging rooftops at stores are a “huge impediment” to solar installation, D’Arcy added. If a roof needs to be replaced in the next 15 to 20 years or sooner, it doesn’t make financial sense for Home Depot to add solar systems today, he said.

“We have a goal of implementing solar rooftop where the economics are attractive,” D’Arcy told CNN.

CNN also reached out to Kroger, which owns about 2,800 stores across the US. Kristal Howard, a Kroger spokesperson, said the company currently has 15 properties — stores, distribution centers and manufacturing plants — with solar installations. One of the “multiple factors affecting the viability of a solar installation” was the stores’ ability to support a solar installation on the roofs, Howard said.

Cowen, the engineering professor at Cornell, said solar is already attractive, but that labor costs, incentives and the different layers of regulation likely pose some financial challenges in solar installations.

“For them, this means usually hiring a local site firm that can do that installation that also knows local policy,” Cowen said. “It’s just another layer of complexity that I think is beginning to make sense because the costs have come down enough, but it needs kind of reopening that door of getting into an existing building.”

Rep. Sean Casten of Illinois, who co-chairs the power sector task force in the House, said the US has “failed to provide the incentives to people who have the expertise to go in and build these things.” The reason both retail companies and the power sector have not made much progress on solar is because “our system is so disjointed” and has a complex regulation structure, Casten said.

“Why aren’t we doing something that makes economic sense? The answer is this horribly disjointed federal policy where we massively subsidize fossil energy extraction, and we penalize clean energy production,” Casten told CNN. “For a long, long time, if you wanted to build a solar panel on the rooftop of Walmart, your biggest enemy was going to be your local utility because they didn’t want to lose the load.

“We could have done this decades ago,” Casten added. “And had we done it, we would not be in this dire position with the climate, but we’d also have a lot more money in our pocket.”

For Charles Callaway, director of organizing at the nonprofit group WE ACT for Environmental Justice, strengthening the rooftop solar capacity in big box retail stores is a no-brainer, especially if companies allow the local community to reap benefits either through installation jobs or sharing the electricity produced later.

Either way, it would put a massive dent in curbing the climate crisis and help usher in an equitable transition away from fossil fuels — and it’s doable, Callaway told CNN.

The New York City resident led a worker training program that helped train more than 100 local community members, mostly people of color, to become solar installers. He also formed a solar workers cooperative to ensure many of the participants of the training program get jobs in a tough market.

In the last two years, Callaway said his group has not only installed solar panels on roofs of affordable housing units, but also equipment capable of producing 2 megawatts of solar energy on shopping malls up in upstate New York. He emphasized that hiring locally would be most beneficial since local installers know the community and local regulations best.

“One of my huge concerns is social equity,” Cowen said. “Access to renewable energy is a fairly privileged position these days, and we’ve got to figure out ways to make that not true.”

Jasmine Graham, WE ACT’s energy justice policy manager, said the potential of building rooftop solar on big box superstores is encouraging, only “if these projects use local labor, if they are paying prevailing wages, and if this solar is being used in a manner such as community solar, which would allow [utility] bill discounts for folks that live in the same utility zone.”

Pressure is mounting for global leaders to act urgently on the climate crisis after a UN report in late February warned the window for action is rapidly closing.

Neumann believes the US can meet its energy demand with renewables. All it takes, she said, is the political will to make that switch, and the inclusion of the local community so no one gets left behind in the transition.

“The sooner we make that transition, the sooner we’ll have cleaner air, the sooner we’ll have a more protected environment and better health and the sooner we’ll have a more livable future for our kids,” Neumann said. “And even if that requires investment, it is an investment worth making.”

CNN
 — 

Lake Powell, the second-largest human-made reservoir in the US, has lost nearly 7% of its potential storage capacity since 1963, when Glen Canyon Dam was built, a new report shows.

In addition to water loss due to an intense multiyear drought, the US Geological Survey and the Bureau of Reclamation report found, Lake Powell faced an average annual loss in storage capacity of about 33,270 acre-feet, or 11 billion gallons, per year between 1963 and 2018.

That’s enough water to fill the Reflecting Pool on the National Mall about 1,600 times.

The capacity of the reservoir is shrinking because of sediments flowing in from the Colorado and San Juan rivers, according to the report. Those sediments settle at the bottom of the reservoir and decrease the total amount of water the reservoir can hold.

As of Monday, Lake Powell was around 25% full, according to data from the Bureau of Reclamation.

It’s bad news for a region already facing water shortages and extreme wildfires due to the drought. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration drought experts said last week these conditions are expected to at least continue – if not worsen – in the coming months.

Lake Powell is an important reservoir in the Colorado River Basin. Both Lake Powell and nearby Lake Mead, the nation’s largest reservoir, have drained at an alarming rate. In August, the federal government declared a water shortage on the Colorado River for the first time after Lake Mead’s water level plunged to unprecedented lows, triggering mandatory water consumption cuts for states in the Southwest that began in January.

And last week, Lake Powell dipped below the critical threshold of 3,525 feet above sea level, sparking additional concerns about water supply and hydropower generation millions of people in the West rely on for electricity.

The significance of the dwindling water supply along the Colorado cannot be overstated.

The system supplies water for more than 40 million people living across seven Western states and Mexico. Lakes Powell and Mead provide a critical supply of drinking water and irrigation for many across the region, including rural farms, ranches and native communities.

“It is vitally important we have the best-available scientific information like this report to provide a clear understanding of water availability in Lake Powell as we plan for the future,” Tanya Trujillo, assistant secretary for water and science with the US Department of Interior, said in a statement. “The Colorado River system faces multiple challenges, including the effects of a 22-year-long drought and the increased impacts of climate change.”

CNN
 — 

Air pollution spiked to unhealthy levels around the world in 2021, according to a new report.

The report by IQAir, a company that tracks global air quality, found that average annual air pollution in every country — and 97% of cities — exceeded the World Health Organization’s air quality guidelines, which were designed to help governments craft regulations to protect public health.

Only 222 cities of the 6,475 analyzed had average air quality that met WHO’s standard. Three territories were found to have met WHO guidelines: the French territory of New Caledonia and the United States territories of Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.

India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were among the countries with the worst air pollution, exceeding the guidelines by at least 10 times.

The Scandinavian countries, Australia, Canada, Japan and United Kingdom ranked among the best countries for air quality, with average levels that exceeded the guidelines by 1 to 2 times.

In the United States, IQAir found air pollution exceeded WHO guidelines by 2 to 3 times in 2021.

“This report underscores the need for governments around the world to help reduce global air pollution,” Glory Dolphin Hammes, CEO of IQAir North America, told CNN. “(Fine particulate matter) kills far too many people every year and governments need to set more stringent air quality national standards and explore better foreign policies that promote better air quality.”

Above: IQAir analyzed average annual air quality for more than 6,000 cities and categorized them from best air quality, in blue (Meets WHO PM2.5 guildline) to worst, in purple (Exceeds WHO PM2.5 guideline by over 10 times). An interactive map is available from IQAir.

It’s the first major global air quality report based on WHO’s new annual air pollution guidelines, which were updated in September 2021. The new guidelines halved the acceptable concentration of fine particulate matter — or PM 2.5 — from 10 down to 5 micrograms per cubic meter.

PM 2.5 is the tiniest pollutant yet also among the most dangerous. When inhaled, it travels deep into lung tissue where it can enter the bloodstream. It comes from sources like the burning of fossil fuels, dust storms and wildfires, and has been linked to a number of health threats including asthma, heart disease and other respiratory illnesses.

Millions of people die each year from air quality issues. In 2016, around 4.2 million premature deaths were associated with fine particulate matter, according to WHO. If the 2021 guidelines had been applied that year, WHO found there could have been nearly 3.3 million fewer pollution-related deaths.

IQAir analyzed pollution-monitoring stations in 6,475 cities across 117 countries, regions and territories.

In the US, air pollution spiked in 2021 compared to 2020. Out of the more than 2,400 US cities analyzed, Los Angeles air remained the most polluted, despite seeing a 6% decrease compared to 2020. Atlanta and Minneapolis saw significant increases in pollution, the report showed.

“The (United States’) reliance on fossil fuels, increasing severity of wildfires as well as varying enforcement of the Clean Air Act from administration to administration have all added to U.S. air pollution,” the authors wrote.

Researchers say the main sources of pollution in the US were fossil fuel-powered transportation, energy production and wildfires, which wreak havoc on the country’s most vulnerable and marginalized communities.

“We are heavily dependent on fossil fuels, especially in terms of transportation,” said Hammes, who lives a few miles from Los Angeles. “We can act smartly on this with zero emissions, but we’re still not doing it. And this is having a devastating impact on the air pollution that we’re seeing in major cities.”

Climate change-fueled wildfires played a significant role in reducing air quality in the US in 2021. The authors pointed to a number of fires that led to hazardous air pollution — including the Caldor and Dixie fires in California, as well as the Bootleg Fire in Oregon, which wafted smoke all the way to the East Coast in July.

China — which is among the countries with the worst air pollution — showed improved air quality in 2021. More than half of the Chinese cities analyzed in the report saw lower levels of air pollution compared to the previous year. The capital city of Beijing continued a five-year trend of improved air quality, according to the report, due to a policy-driven drawdown of polluting industries in the city.

The report also found that the Amazon Rainforest, which had acted as the world’s major defender against the climate crisis, emitted more carbon dioxide than it absorbed last year. Deforestation and wildfires have threatened the critical ecosystem, polluted the air and contributed to climate change.

“This is all a part of the formula that will lead to or is leading to global warming.” Hammes said.

The report also unveiled some inequalities: Monitoring stations remain scant in some developing countries in Africa, South America and the Middle East, resulting in a dearth of air quality data in those regions.

“When you don’t have that data, you’re really in the dark,” Hammes said.

Hammes noted the African country of Chad was included in the report for the first time, due to an improvement in its monitoring network. IQAir found the country’s air pollution was the second-highest in the world last year, behind Bangladesh.

Tarik Benmarhnia, a climate change epidemiologist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography who has studied the health impact of wildfire smoke, also noted that relying only on monitoring stations can lead to blind spots in these reports.

“I think it is great that they relied on different networks and not only governmental sources,” Benmarhnia, who was not involved in this report, told CNN. “However, many regions do not have enough stations and alternative techniques exist.”

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded in its 2021 report that, in addition to slowing the speed of global warming, curbing the use of fossil fuels would have the added benefit of improving air quality and public health.

Hammes said the IQAir report is even more reason for the world to wean off fossil fuel.

“We’ve got the report, we can read it, we can internalize it and really devote ourselves to taking action,” she said. “There needs to be a major move towards renewable energy. We need to take drastic action in order to reverse the tide of global warming; otherwise, the impact and the train that we’re on (would be) irreversible.”

CNN
 — 

Nelly Cheboi, who in 2019 quit a lucrative software engineering job in Chicago to create computer labs for Kenyan schoolchildren, is the 2022 CNN Hero of the Year.

Online voters selected her from among this year’s Top 10 CNN Heroes.

Cheboi’s nonprofit, TechLit Africa, has provided thousands of students across rural Kenya with access to donated, upcycled computers — and the chance at a brighter future.

Cheboi accepted the award with her mother, who she said “worked really hard to educate us.” At the beginning of her acceptance speech, Cheboi and her mother sang a song onstage that she explained had a special meaning when she was growing up.

As CNN Hero of the Year, Cheboi will receive $100,000 to expand her work. She and the other top 10 CNN Heroes honored at Sunday’s gala all receive a $10,000 cash award and, for the first time, additional grants, organizational training and support from The Elevate Prize Foundation through a new collaboration with CNN Heroes. Nelly will also be named an Elevate Prize winner, which comes with a $300,000 grant and additional support worth $200,000 for her nonprofit.

Cheboi grew up in poverty in Mogotio, a rural township in Kenya. “I know the pain of poverty,” said Cheboi, 29. “I never forgot what it was like with my stomach churning because of hunger at night.”

A hard-working student, Cheboi received a full scholarship to Augustana College in Illinois in 2012. She began her studies there with almost no experience with computers, handwriting papers and struggling to transcribe them onto a laptop.

Everything changed in her junior year, though, when Cheboi took a programming course required for her mathematics major.

“When I discovered computer science, I just fell in love with it. I knew that this is something that I wanted to do as my career, and also bring it to my community,” she told CNN.

Many basic computer skills were still a steep learning curve, however. Cheboi remembers having to practice touch-typing for six months before she could pass a coding interview. Touch-typing is a skill that is now a core part of the TechLit curriculum.

“I feel so accomplished seeing kids that are 7 years old touch-typing, knowing that I just learned how to touch-type less than five years ago,” she said.

Once she had begun working in the software industry, Cheboi soon realized the extent of which computers were being thrown away as companies upgraded their technology infrastructure.

“We have kids here (in Kenya) — myself included, back in the day — who don’t even know what a computer is,” she said.

So, in 2018, she began transporting donated computers back to Kenya — in her personal luggage, handling customs fees and taxes herself.

“At one point, I was bringing 44 computers, and I paid more for the luggage than I did for the air ticket,” she said.

A year later, she co-founded TechLit Africa with a fellow software engineer after both quit their jobs. The nonprofit accepts computer donations from companies, universities and individuals.

The hardware is wiped and refurbished before it’s shipped to Kenya. There, it’s distributed to partner schools in rural communities, where students ages 4 to 12 receive daily classes and frequent opportunities to learn from professionals, gaining skills that will help improve their education and better prepare them for future jobs.

“We have people who own a specific skill coming in and are just inspiring the kids (with) music production, video production, coding, personal branding,” Cheboi said. “They can go from doing a remote class with NASA on education to music production.”

The organization currently serves 10 schools; within the next year, Cheboi hopes to be partnered with 100 more.

“My hope is that when the first TechLit kids graduate high school, they’re able to get a job online because they will know how to code, they will know how to do graphic design, they will know how to do marketing,” Cheboi said. “The world is your oyster when you are educated. By bringing the resources, by bringing these skills, we are opening up the world to them.”

Watch the moment CNN’s Hero of the Year is announced

Watch the moment CNN’s Hero of the Year is announced

01:30

An inspiring night of heroism and advocacy

CNN’s Anderson Cooper and ABC’s Kelly Ripa co-hosted the 16th Annual “CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute,” which featured more than a dozen celebrity presenters.

“We’re so deeply honored to be here,” said actress and singer Sofia Carson, who perfomed a song with award-winning songwriter Diane Warren at the event. “Diane wrote this incredible anthem ‘Applause’ for those leading, surviving and fighting and tonight we dedicate this song and performance to our heroes.”

Actor Aubrey Plaza introduced CNN Hero Aidan Reilly, who launched his nonprofit while home from college during the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“From his pandemic couch, Aidan and his friends co-founded Farmlink Project,” Plaza said. The nonprofit connects excess food from farms across the US – food that would otherwise be wasted – to those who need it. “In just two years, he .. has moved more than 70 million pounds,” Plaza added.

Debra Vines – whose nonprofit The Answer Inc. supports families impacted by autism in underserved communities across Chicago – was honored by actress Holly Robinson Peete, a “fellow autism mom.”

Vines says her group has provided programming and guidance to more than 4,000 families. “Join me and be a servant for the change today,” Vines said when accepting her award.

And Emmy award-winning actor Justin Theroux brought his rescue dog Kuma, on the stage to honor Carie Broecker ​​and her nonprofit, Peace of Mind Dog Rescue.

Two teenagers making a difference in their communities were also honored as 2022 Young Wonders:

Ruby Chitsey, a 15-year-old from Harrison, Arkansas, started “Three Wishes for Ruby’s Residents,” which donates personal items to nursing home residents who couldn’t otherwise afford them.

Sri Nihal Tammana, a 13-year-old from Edison, New Jersey, started “Recycle My Battery,” which keeps used batteries out of the ecosystem through a network of collection bins.

The show also honored two Georgia poll workers, Shaye Moss and her mother Ruby Freeman, whose lives were upended after false allegations that they had been involved in election fraud spread on social media.

CNN has partnered with GoFundMe to enable donations to this year’s Top 10 honorees. GoFundMe is the world’s largest fundraising platform that empowers people and charities to give and receive help. Supporters can make online donations to the Top 10 CNN Heroes’ non-profit organizations directly from CNNHeroes.com. Subaru is matching all donations up to $50,000 for each of this year’s honorees through January 3, 2023.

Do you know someone in your community doing amazing things to make the world a better place? Keep an eye on CNN.com/heroes and consider nominating that person as a CNN Hero in 2023. You can also read more about many of the 350 past CNN Heroes who have helped over 55 million people across all 50 US states and in more than 110 countries around the world.

CNN
 — 

Some people travel the world in search of adventure, while others seek out natural wonders, cultural landmarks or culinary experiences. But French photographer François Prost was looking for something altogether different during his recent road trip across America: strip clubs.

From Miami to Los Angeles, Prost’s latest book “Gentlemen’s Club” charts his route across the US via nearly 150 strip clubs with names like Pleasures, Temptations and Cookies N’ Cream. There isn’t a single nude woman to be seen, however, as Prost’s camera was exclusively trained on the buildings themselves — and specifically their often-colorful facades.

Over the course of five weeks in 2019 he traversed over 6,000 miles, with the resulting photos capturing everything from the pastel hues of Florida’s Club Pink Pussycat to venues hiding in plain sight in the country’s more religious states.

“I’d divide these venues into two types: One is very integrated into the public landscape, and one is a bit more hidden and dodgy,” Prost said, speaking to CNN on a video call and email.

The first type, he added, could be found in “very American” settings, such as “around amusement parks and fast food and malls.” The latter venues, however, would sometimes look indistinguishable from any store in a strip mall. Prost said he found many such establishments along the Bible Belt, a socially conservative region in the country’s south. He was especially keen to explore the area due to the apparent contrast between the prevalence of strip clubs and what he describes in his book as “conservatism and extreme puritanism.”

Prost insisted that he had little interest in the interiors or services of the strip clubs, which he always visited during the day. Instead, he hoped to learn more about American culture by creating objective, documentary-style photographs of establishments sitting at the intersection of sex, gender and commerce. Documenting changing attitudes toward sex through the lens of architecture, he added that the series was primarily of a landscape photography project.

“The prism of this theme of strip club facades became a way of studying and trying to understand the country,” he wrote in “Gentlemen’s Club,” photographs from which will feature in an exhibition in Tokyo in March.

”(‘Gentlemen’s Club’ is) an objective panorama of dominant opinions and gender and the sexualization of the feminine image.”

The genesis of Prost’s project dates back to his 2018 series, “After Party,” which focused on the flamboyant facades of French nightclubs. He said that people frequently commented that the buildings’ exteriors looked as though they had been ripped straight out of American cities, sparking the idea that he should visit the US and extend the project.

As he meticulously planned his trip, he was struck not only by the sheer volume of strip clubs in America but that — unlike In Europe — they often demanded to be seen. Hot pink walls, gigantic nude silhouettes and even candy-cane-striped storefronts made no secret of the kind of entertainment provided inside.

“A good example would be Las Vegas, where strip clubs are everywhere and their signs blink as much as a fast food (restaurant) or casino sign,” Prost said.

Miami’s clubs were often painted in vivid, Wes Anderson-esque hues. Other photos show brightly covered venues contrasting with their sparse desert surroundings.

If the establishments were open during the day, Prost would enter and ask for permission to take photos in order “to not look suspicious… and explain what my intentions were,” he said. The interiors rarely lived up to the tantalizing promises plastered across the signs outside, but the photographer met a host of characters during his five-week trip, from indifferent bouncers to managers who were thrilled about the project.

“Most of the time, people were OK — 99% of them would say yes to a facade picture,” he said, adding they typically wouldn’t mind his presence, as long as he didn’t take photos of patrons or dancers.

“Some would think that it was a bit strange, some would be really excited about it and give me their business card to send me the picture when it was done,” he said.

Prost said his biggest surprise, however, was how “normalized” strip clubs appeared to be in everyday life. As he reflects in his book, “The relationship that Americans seem to have with strip clubs is quite different to what you see in Europe. Going to a strip club seems to be a lot more normalized … You go as a couple, or amongst friends at night to have fun.”

He was struck, for instance, by the fact that so many Las Vegas strip clubs doubled as restaurants — with many boasting happy hour deals, buffets and special discounts for truck drivers or construction workers.

“I noticed a few strip clubs that would advertise being a strip club and steakhouse, so you could eat a big piece of meat (while) watching strippers. That is also something that seems very American to me,” he said, adding: “I heard from some people I met in Portland there are even strip clubs (that offer) vegan food.”

The facades are littered with jokes like “My sex life is like the Sahara, 2 palms, no dates” and pun-based names like Booby Trap and Bottoms Up. Prost’s documentarian approach heightens the signs’ surreal comedy. But it also doubles as a neutral lens through which viewers can make up their own minds about the objectification of women.

By honing in on the faceless dancing bodies of female silhouettes and the quintessential “girls girls girls” signs, “Gentleman’s Club” explores the commodification of women who are, in reality, completely absent in Prost’s works (an observation reflected in the book’s title, which is a phrase that crops up numerous times on signs throughout his photographs). The strip clubs he visited market women as things to be consumed, from the many food-themed names to an advertisement reading, “1,000’s of beautiful girls & three ugly ones.”

For his next project, Prost plans to visit Japan to document the nation’s love hotels, which occupy a similar role as strip clubs in some parts of the US: open secrets in a conservative society. But the photographer believes the American establishments he visited say something unique about the country — something that is less about sexuality and more about the American dream.

What his project has shown him is, he said, this: “As long as you’re successful in terms of business, (it doesn’t matter) if your activity deals with sex.”

“Gentlemen’s Club” will be exhibited at Agnes b. Galerie Boutique in Tokyo, Japan, between March 17 and April 15, 2023. The book, published by Fisheye Editions, is available now.

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“Old Masters” such as Leonardo da Vinci, Sandro Botticelli and Rembrandt may have used proteins, especially egg yolk, in their oil paintings, according to a new study.

Trace quantities of protein residue have long been detected in classic oil paintings, though they were often ascribed to contamination. A new study published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications found the inclusion was likely intentional — and sheds light on the technical knowledge of the Old Masters, the most skilled European painters of the 16th, 17th, or early 18th century, and the way they prepared their paints.

“There are very few written sources about this and no scientific work has been done before to investigate the subject in such depth,” said study author Ophélie Ranquet of the Institute of Mechanical Process Engineering and Mechanics at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany, in a phone interview. “Our results show that even with a very small amount of egg yolk, you can achieve an amazing change of properties in the oil paint, demonstrating how it might have been beneficial for the artists.”

Simply adding some egg yolk to their works, it turns out, could have long-lasting effects that went beyond just aesthetics.

Compared with the medium formulated by ancient Egyptians called tempera — which combines egg yolk with powdered pigments and water — oil paint creates more intense colors, allows for very smooth color transitions and dries far less quickly, so it can be used for several days after its preparation. However, oil paint, which uses linseed or safflower oil instead of water, also has drawbacks, including being more susceptible to color darkening and damage caused by exposure to light.

Because making paint was an artisanal and experimental process, it is possible that the Old Masters might have added egg yolk, a familiar ingredient, to the newer type of paint, which first showed up in the seventh century in Central Asia before spreading to Northern Europe in the Middle Ages and Italy during the Renaissance. In the study, the researchers recreated the process of paint-making by using four ingredients — egg yolk, distilled water, linseed oil and pigment — to mix two historically popular and significant colors, lead white and ultramarine blue.

“The addition of egg yolk is beneficial because it can tune the properties of these paints in a drastic way,” Ranquet said, “For example by showing aging differently: It takes a longer time for the paint to oxidize, because of the antioxidants contained in the yolk.”

The chemical reactions between the oil, the pigment and the proteins in the yolk directly affect the paint’s behavior and viscosity. “For example, the lead white pigment is quite sensitive to humidity, but if you coat it with a protein layer, it makes it a lot more resistant to it, making the paint quite easy to apply,” Ranquet said.

“On the other hand, if you wanted something stiffer without having to add a lot of pigment, with a bit of egg yolk you can create a high impasto paint,” she added, referring to a painting technique where the paint is laid out in a stroke thick enough that the brushstrokes are still visible. Using less pigment would have been desirable centuries ago, when certain pigments — such as lapis lazuli, which was used to make ultramarine blue — were more expensive than gold, according to Ranquet.

A direct evidence of the effect of egg yolk in oil paint, or lack thereof, can be seen in Leonardo da Vinci’s “Madonna of the Carnation,” one of the paintings observed during the study. Currently on display at the Alte Pinakothek in Munich, Germany, the work shows evident wrinkling on the face of Mary and the child.

“Oil paint starts to dry from the surface down, which is why it wrinkles,” Ranquet said.

One reason for wrinkling may be an insufficient quantity of pigments in the paint, and the study has shown that this effect could be avoided with the addition of egg yolk: “That’s quite amazing because you have the same quantity of pigment in your paint, but the presence of the egg yolk changes everything.”

Because wrinkling occurs within days, it’s likely that Leonardo and other Old Masters might have caught onto this particular effect, as well as additional beneficial properties of egg yolk in oil paint, including resistance to humidity. The “Madonna of Carnation” is one of Leonardo’s earliest paintings, created at a time when he might have been still trying to master the then newly popular medium of oil paint.

New understanding of the classics

Another painting observed during the study was “The Lamentation Over the Dead Christ,” by Botticelli, also on display at the Alte Pinakothek. The work is mostly made with tempera, but oil paint has been used for the background and some secondary elements.

“We knew that some parts of the paintings show brushstrokes that are typical for what we call an oil painting, and yet we detected the presence of proteins,” Ranquet said. “Because it’s a very small quantity and they are difficult to detect, this might be dismissed as contamination: In workshops, artists used many different things, and maybe the eggs were just from the tempera.”

However, because adding egg yolk had such desirable effects on oil paint, the presence of proteins in the work might be an indication of deliberate use instead, the study suggested. Ranquet hopes that these preliminary findings might attract more curiosity toward this understudied topic.

Maria Perla Colombini, a professor of analytical chemistry at the University of Pisa in Italy, who was not involved in the study, agreed. “This exciting paper provides a new scenario for the understanding of old painting techniques,” she said in an email.

“The research group, reporting results from molecular level up to a macroscopic scale, contributes to a new knowledge in the use of egg yolk and oil binders. They are not more looking at simply identifying the materials used by Old Masters but explain how they could produce wonderful and glittering effects by employing and mixing the few available natural materials. They try to discover the secrets of old recipes of which little or nothing is written,” she added.

“This new knowledge contributes not only to a better conservation and preservation of artworks but also to a better comprehension of art history.”

Top image: The “Mona Lisa” by Leonardo Da Vinci