What did you eat for breakfast? Imagining Africa’s conservation future starts with simple questions

What did you eat for breakfast today?

Now imagine the year is 2100. You’re still living on this continent. What does your breakfast look like then? Where did the food come from? Is it grown locally, sustainably? Does it nourish you and the land?

This question – simple, even playful – sparked a powerful discussion at a recent conservation workshop held in Gqeberha, South Africa. It wasn’t just about food. It was about the future: how we live, what we value and whether the Africa of tomorrow is one where people and nature thrive together.

The event, called Exploring Conservation Futures in Africa, was hosted by Wilderness Foundation Africa. It brought together people from all over the continent – scientists, academics, youth leaders, conservationists and policy experts – to ask big questions about where Africa is headed and how we can shape that path ourselves.

The report from that workshop, released last week, is a bold, hopeful vision for the continent. It insists that Africa’s future must be imagined and built by Africans, for Africans, and that conservation is not just about protecting animals or trees. It’s about ensuring Africa’s long-term prosperity and sustainability – our cultures, our cities, our food systems and our ways of life.

Why breakfast?

The breakfast question may seem small, but it gets to the heart of a much bigger idea: that the future is lived in everyday moments.

What you eat says something about your economy, your environment and your values. In the year 2100, will our food come from regenerative farms powered by clean energy? Will we eat more plants, waste less and grow food closer to home? Will communities have control over their own food security?

Traditional lifestyles have a message for the future. (Photo: Don Pinnock)

At the workshop, participants imagined breakfasts that came from vertical farms, community gardens and water-wise agriculture. These meals told a story of a continent that had turned the tide – from crisis to resilience, from dependency to self-sufficiency.

This exercise opened the door to bigger questions: What will our cities look like? How will we power our homes? What kind of schools will our children attend? And how can conservation help get us there?

Imagining the future

Understanding nature. (Source: Gqeberha workshop report)

The Gqeberha workshop was a call to dream – intentionally, creatively, and collectively. The idea was simple: if we can’t picture a better future, how can we build it?

To help with this, the workshop used a few tools. One was the Nature’s Futures Framework, which asks us how we relate to nature. Do we see it as something that serves us (like giving us water or timber)? Do we value it for its own sake, even if we get nothing from it? Or is it part of who we are – our culture, our beliefs, our stories? For many in the room, the answer was all of these.

For many participants, these value systems were shaped through uniquely African experiences and perspectives. Examples included people living in harmony with nature by following guidance offered by indigenous knowledge systems, something which participants acknowledged had been forcibly eroded across the continent through colonialism.

The message was clear: African conservation can’t copy-paste Western models. It must honour the continent’s own values, languages, knowledge systems and lived realities.

A tale of three futures

Another way participants explored the future was through the Three Horizons Framework. It breaks the journey ahead into three stages:

Horizon one – the world in crisis

This is the world we’re in now – or dangerously close to if we continue “business as usual”. Fossil fuels still dominate. Powerful foreign companies extract African resources with little care for the people or environments they harm. Conservation funding is low and many governments focus on short-term gains.

If this continues, we risk losing the ecosystems that support all life, including our own.

Horizon two – a world in transition

This is the messy middle – a time of change, conflict and experimentation. Investments in renewable energy are mainstreamed. Youth movements gain ground and education is widely accessible. Indigenous knowledge is integrated into policy. Local economies test out new models, like paying communities for protecting nature.

It’s not smooth sailing. The old systems don’t give up easily. But the seeds of a better world begin to grow.

Horizon three – a viable future

This is the Africa participants dreamed of for 2100. Fossil fuels are gone. Nature is respected and protected – not only in parks, but in cities, schools and economies. The Global Happiness Index replaces GDP. Leadership includes young people, traditional leaders and women. Nature has legal rights and harming the Earth is treated as a serious crime.

Traditional fishers in Principe. (Photo: Don Pinnock)

In this future, your breakfast doesn’t cost the planet. Your city has green spaces, clean air and safe transport. And your children learn about the land not only from textbooks, but from elders, storytellers and farmers.

So how do we get there?

Moving from Horizon One to Horizon Three will take work – and imagination. But the report lays out some clear steps:

• Cut fossil fuel subsidies and invest in clean energy such as solar, wind, and hydrogen.


• Provide free internet across the continent, so that everyone – especially young people – can access knowledge and connect with others.


• Use technology wisely, including AI tools that help us track wildlife, predict droughts or manage forests.


• Support indigenous knowledge and include local stakeholders in decision-making.


• Replace GDP with measures of wellbeing that value health, education, equity and joy.


• Recognise the rights of nature in law and treat environmental destruction as a crime.

These aren’t dreams – they’re already happening in pockets across Africa. The task is to grow them, connect them and give them the support they need to thrive.

In African cultures, storytelling has always been a tool for teaching, warning, celebrating and passing on wisdom. (Photo: Don Pinnock)

The missing pieces: what we don’t know 

The report also identifies key knowledge gaps that are holding progress back. Among them:

• How do we get governments and voters to care more about conservation?


• How can we use media, art and storytelling to reach people emotionally, not just intellectually?


• What are the new ways to fund conservation – beyond grants and donations?


• How do we engage young people not just as students, but as leaders?

Answers to these questions will shape how quickly and fairly we can build the future we want.

A culture of hope

One of the most powerful ideas in the report is that hope is not naive – it’s strategic.

Africa has long been portrayed as a place of crisis. Conservation messaging often focuses on loss, extinction and disaster. But this can create fatigue, fear or even apathy.

The workshop pushed for a new narrative – one that shows what’s possible, what’s working and what’s worth fighting for. That means telling stories that lift people up, not just weigh them down.

Cities need to learn from traditional village life. (Photo: Don Pinnock)

In African cultures, storytelling has always been a tool for teaching, warning, celebrating and passing on wisdom. The report calls for reclaiming this power – through media, music, education and comedy – to build a culture of hope, action and resilience.

As a next step, Wilderness Foundation Africa is developing a Guide to Africa in 2100 – a creative project showcasing what life might look like if we follow the paths laid out in the report. It will include ideas like sponge cities that soak up floodwaters, hybrid transport systems that combine tradition and tech and communities where young people and elders govern together.

The guide is not just for policymakers. It’s for everyone. It’s an invitation to imagine.

A new morning

So, what did you eat for breakfast today?

In 75 years, your grandchildren might remember it differently. They might live in cities powered by wind, surrounded by trees, learning from teachers who speak of both science and spirit. They might walk past community gardens, harvest their own food and know the names of birds and plants in their own languages.

This isn’t a utopia. It’s a choice.

The Exploring Conservation Futures in Africa report reminds us that the future is not something that just happens to us. It’s something we co-create, meal by meal, policy by policy, story by story. DM

Read Part 1 of this series here.

Disclosure: Dr Don Pinnock is on the board of the Wilderness Foundation. He was not involved in the planning or process of the Gqeberha workshop.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REeWvTRUpMk