By ELSIE EYAKUZE

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The rumour is that electric cars are very quiet if you are used to the usual petrol combustion engine. I didn’t expect to find out for myself any time soon because this is a country of second-hand cars, preferably affordable models from big Asian manufacturers.

Also, we’re nowhere near being the kind of country where every household has access to clean piped water let alone personal vehicles that aren’t bicycles. Car-owning is still a bit of a luxury for most people. And finally: new technologies tend to be expensive, especially when they might actually be good for the environment. No way I was expecting to see one of them in the wild.

So imagine my surprise when I actually came across an electric vehicle recently. It wasn’t anything like I had imagined, not a glamorous Tesla but a three-wheeled motorcycle cart contraption that was small, efficient and evidently quite productive-looking. Honestly, it was a beautiful meeting of form and function married with utility.

The man driving it was kind enough to explain a few things: it is incredibly energy friendly in terms of the charging time and battery efficiency, it’s just zippy enough to get around without trying to be a race car.

The best thing is that price of the contraption sounds just about close enough to our Gross National Income Per Capita, according to the online World Bank statistics: hovering somewhere around $2,500 per annum as of 2019. In other words, quite achievable for many people, especially those working and hustling in the urban growth areas.

I stepped back and thought to myself that this might be just the kind of good news that’s needed right now: affordable transportation gadgets for a low-income country that is probably environmentally friendly.

I have been worried for a long time now that like adequate protein or holidays or good health, environmental safety was something that only the few rich could afford.

Just a couple weeks ago a report came out from the United Nations’ climate panel about how we are faring on the planet and prospects for a liveable future. Let me put it more mildly than they did: we are in horrendous trouble. Very deep, deep, deep trouble. I have suspected this was the case for a while now but getting one’s fears acknowledged with data is not fun. Even if we change our consumption habits we might be dooming the coming generations.

Same thing I heard last century, last millennium even, if we are counting. For the longest time, renewable energy has been touted as the way forward. As someone living in an unreasonably sunny environment, I was absolutely up for it.

Solar energy? By all means, yes. Africa and the Middle East together could probably power the world without having to resort to fossil fuels! Wave energy, wind power, clean burning gas cookers? Yes! It sounded possible, progressive and achievable, just like free and fair democracies. But here we are.

A lot of very smart people have been working on this troublesome environmental issue for a while. By a while, I guess I mean the course of human history. We are dependent and part of the greater whole of the earth, not apart from it. This means that it’s not really a one-species issue either.

As our technology has got more efficient, we have been able to do this better and better. Unfortunately, neoliberals have convinced us that perpetual growth is good for “everyone” we left our relationships to the earth behind a profit margin.

Biodiversity cannot be quantified for profit all the time, nor can the cost of separating ourselves from that which generates us. With great technology comes great responsibility. We have used technology to make humanity better, but I think that somewhere along the way we forgot how to be reciprocal in our relationship to the ecosystems that sustain us. This is one of the reasons why the few indigenous communities we have left around the world are so important to us, soon enough we may have to learn from them how to connect to our environments again.

The acknowledgment that we have overtaxed our planet is probably why the richest men on earth are either trying to design a base on mars or a space station in orbit. Part of it is pure competition, sure, but from down here it does look like they are actively looking for alternative living environments which are out of the reach of the majority, doesn’t it?

It would all be so disheartening if I didn’t see a three-wheel motorcycle go by one day. Zippy little thing, just a few electricity units to charge it overnight, affordable. Right here in our dusty little streets.

Even with all the indicators pointing to disaster, someone optimistic figured out how to scale down electrical vehicles for markets in countries which are developing. I like this kind of courage in the face of seemingly insurmountable challenges.

The icing on the cake? Yes, electrical vehicles really are quiet and I got to find out right here. Maybe, the future holds possibility.

Elsie Eyakuze is a consultant and blogger for The Mikocheni Report: E-mail: [email protected]