Meet a PNB Ambassador: Venan A. Sondo, Sustainability Executive, Co-Founder & CEO, CEFEMAC

Venan A. Sondo

My name is Venan Akumbom Sondo, I'm from Kedjom Keku (Big Babanki), in Tubah Sub-Division in the North West Region

I currently live in London and I am Co-founder & CEO of CEFEMAC, an interdisciplinary environmental management and change organization currently operating in Bamenda. Professionally, I am a Sustainability Executive in the corporate sustainability transformation space.

My greatest achievement so far has been the project initiator and chief architect for the second only ‘Clean Development Mechanism (CDM)’ project in Cameroon for clean cook stoves under the UN Kyoto Protocol in collaboration with ‘Envirofit International’, a global clean cook stove manufacturer.

I like the beautiful landscape, rich and diverse cultural heritage of the North West Region. Its people are unique and dynamic with a natural tendency to excel in their endeavours. I like the openness and progressive attitude of its people, always open to innovation but very critical at times and rightly so!

My commitment towards the North West Region is to ensure that one day every woman in the North West Region owns a clean cooking technology. I look back and remember most of my aunties, sisters, and brothers and even me cooking in heavily smoked kitchens. In-door air pollution is actually a killer syndrome. In fact, mortality from illnesses relating to indoor air pollution is higher than mortality from tuberculosis, HIV and malaria combined in the world every year. In Cameroon alone, over 11,000 people mostly women and children die from indoor air pollution related illnesses and probably second to HIV and even higher than malaria deaths.

It was a no brainer to pull all the shots I could to ensure that women in this area benefit from a technology that produces 80% less smoke during cooking, can provide up to 70% in firewood savings and also cooks quicker with the opportunity I had. This clean cooking technology called the M-5000 firewood cook stove is currently being distributed in Bamenda with the intention of expanding to other Regions of Cameroon, thanks to a team of like-minded individuals especially ‘Bofas Sarl’ our distribution partner. I hope that one day all women in the North West Region and Cameroon entirely will be able to benefit from this technology.

I owe a lot to the North West Region and its people with respect to my heritage, foundation, education and their kindness evident on the streets of Bamenda. It was a natural decision to start in Bamenda within an environment we perfectly understood bearing in mind that its people are progressive and receptive to innovation. My favourite quote from which I draw my inspiration is the fact that we are not tasked to turn the world upside down, but to do what is necessary at a given place with due consideration of reality. I strongly believe that as individuals we can collectively shape the future of the North West Region if we co-ordinate our endeavours strategically in a manner that will yield tangible synergies, catalyzing measurable actions and not the usual almost disruptive rhetoric. I really admire the few groups that have been able to distinguish themselves from the pack to make a clear difference in their contributions.

I think Project New Bamenda is a perfect channel where we of the North West Region can spotlight the unsung heroes within our community and encourage them accordingly. Unfortunately as a folk, we do not really get to encourage and acknowledge our own folk enough and I think I have seen an end to this in Project New Bamenda. Project New Bamenda is a dynamic platform that will create pathways to harness environmental, social and business initiatives in the North West Region and inspire our youth.

As a Sustainability Executive I strongly believe that it makes perfect sense to align environmental, social and economic dimensions with business objectives. I hope that with CEFEMAC, we will be able to one day operate a world famous change institute in Bamenda where we will leverage our global connections and thought leadership to inspire and pioneer change within communities and business enterprises. We hope to make a tangible contribution towards a development in Bamenda and Cameroon as a whole that is founded on sound sustainable practices considering the scale of challenges confronting our society today.

One Last One

• My favourite dish is definitely “kote-kote” (grilled chicken fried in palm oil and the usual fufu) although I am a fan of ekwang I must admit. So passionate about ekwang I had to call my mum from Brazil for her ekwang recipe as I tried to impress my Brazilian friends with Cameroonian cuisine; I will not say how it went throughJ! You could hardly find anything on ekwang on the internet in the early 21^st Century or yes, time flies indeed.

• My favourite proverb from Bamenda is “One hand no fit tie bundle”. This reminds me every day of the plethora of organisations in Cameroon and in the diaspora struggling in their various corners and making an impact of course, albeit reinventing the wheel and repeating the same mistakes in most instances. We would rarely succeed as individuals if we want to incite meaningful change and I have always been a fan of collective endeavours (that matter) and collaborative platforms. I hope Project New Bamenda will do something unique towards this issue.

  
  

• VENAN means “let’s be happy” and AKUMBOM means “its God given” something like ‘Theodore’ in English. So my name literally means “let’s be happy for it is God given”. In English it would have been something like “Joy Theodore Sondo” but thank God I hail from the North West Region where it makes perfect sense in my dialectJ!