Climate data work rarely happens in neat disciplinary boxes. The sessions at this year's Festival & Expo reflect that: they cut across agriculture, health, disaster risk, and early warning systems, and they bring together practitioners who don't always share a stage. By examining these interconnected topics, which are often addressed in isolation, the sessions aim to break down silos and promote more integrated, holistic approaches.
This gathering is an opportunity to come together and interrogate whether our current tools and data systems are actually fit for purpose. And it provides climate data experts and scientists with practical examples they can apply in their day-to-day work.
Sessions not to miss
ICON Data and Learning Labs — Building the Data Quality Chain: Strengthening Hands-on Skills for Climate and Agriculture Development (June 3, 2 pm) One of the few sessions at the Festival & Expo that takes a deliberately practical, hands-on approach to data quality at the climate-agriculture intersection. The ICON approach looks at agriculture, climate, and nutrition together rather than treating them as separate tracks — useful if your work tends to sit in one of those silos.
Africa’s Climate & Health Data Moment: Playbook Launch & Fellow Showcase (June 2, 2 pm) This session launches the CAN Playbook, with fellows presenting projects that have moved from design into real-world application. Worth attending to see what country-level capacity building actually looks like when it gets past the pilot stage — and to hear what worked and what didn't.
Kenya Space Agency and Kenya National Bureau of Statistics — Harnessing Data and Space Technologies for Climate Action and Disaster Risk Reduction (June 4, 4pm) Two co-hosts of the Festival & Expo & Expo in one room, working through a question that is directly relevant to Africa's climate vulnerability.
From Satellite to Startup: Unlocking Earth Observation Data for AI in Africa (June 4, 4pm) Organised through the GIZ AI Made in Africa project, this session asks why open Earth Observation datasets — despite growing availability — are still not making it into deployable AI systems across African ecosystems.
The Youth Early Warning Lab: Designing Data Systems that Anticipate Crisis Before It Escalates (June 4, 8am) Framed around youth distress indicators, but the underlying system design challenge — how to build data infrastructure that detects and responds to slow-moving crises before they become acute — is directly transferable to climate early warning work.
Explore the full program here.
One thing to watch for
We often get distracted by the shiny announcement of the new solution, tool, or database. But with limited resources, we need to be asking how new tools and technologies for climate risk mitigation are building on, and connecting to, existing solutions, ensuring we avoid duplicating efforts and incurring unnecessary costs. Solutions need to be sustainable and connected to ensure we can make meaningful progress on these critical issues.