TED Talks: The Official TED Guide to Public Speaking

by Chris J. Anderson

Ernesto Sirolli wanted to give a talk about a better approach to development aid in Africa. If you’re going to take on a tough subject like that, it’s a very good idea to connect with the audience first. Here’s how he did it. Our first project . . . was where we Italians decided to teach Zambian people how to grow food. So we arrived there with Italian seeds in southern Zambia in this absolutely magnificent valley going down to the Zambezi River, and we taught the local people how to grow Italian tomatoes and zucchini and . . . And of course the local people had absolutely no interest in doing that . . . And we were amazed that the local people, in such a fertile valley, would not have any agriculture. But instead of asking them how come they were not growing anything, we simply said, “Thank God we’re here. Just in the nick of time to save the Zambian people from starvation.” And of course, everything in Africa grew beautifully. We had these magnificent tomatoes . . . And we could not believe, and we were telling the Zambians, “Look how easy agriculture is.” When the tomatoes were nice and ripe and red, overnight, some two hundred hippos came out from the river and they ate everything. And we said to the Zambians, “My God, the hippos!” And the Zambians said, “Yes, that’s why we have no agriculture here.”