By Heba El-Rafey A nomad walks through the desert, and as the hours pass, he begins to thirst for cold water. As the day continues and he exerts greater energy, he needs to replenish his energy through the benefit of a hot meal. Finally, nature calls, and he looks to find relief without polluting the environment. Can you help him? Perhaps you would say, let's build him a home, install electricity and establish a sewage system for his waste. But would that not remove his nomad status? And is it the most cost-effective and productive answer? The young think differently. Instead, they choose to equip him with a portable refrigerator that cools through solar energy, a solar umbrella that can provide the energy needed for his cooking stove, and a biodegradable waste bag which he can use and leave on the land, eventually fertilising the ground it lays on. These and many other innovative ideas were discussed at the "Fifth Global YES (Youth, Entrepreneurship, Sustainability) Summit: Rework the World," which took place in Leksand, Sweden in June this year. A sea of 1,700 keen participants from 120 countries worldwide filled the conference with bubbling ideas. They were keen to see youth be part of the solution (about 50 per cent of the participants were indeed youth). They were also keen to be a part of a movement that meets the needs of the future in terms of environmental issues and job creation with innovation and in a spirit of green -- or sustainable -- entrepreneurship. Participants deliberated over how best to create opportunities for themselves while feeding back to the world at large; in particular, how to drastically transform their surroundings -- sometimes from literal waste grounds to green community parks. They agreed that YES they should, YES they could, and YES they will make a change in the world around them. Will you join them? This week's Soapbox speaker is director of Dialogue Forum, Bibliotheca Alexandrina.
