Localizing Impact through Leadership, Culture, and Collaboration
18 September 2026 | Nairobi, Kenya
On 18 September 2026, CoCuDi Center, in collaboration with the Glocal International Development Program, convened Shifting the Center in Nairobi – a day of exchange bringing together development practitioners, policymakers, academics and community leaders to explore what localization means in practice.
The forum examined how development can move beyond externally driven models toward approaches that recognize local leadership, knowledge and capacity as essential assets for sustainable change. Through keynote reflections, locally led development case studies, a conversation on cultural heritage and restitution, and an interactive workshop on climate and sustainable energy policy, the day created space for participants to share experiences across sectors and consider how global knowledge can engage more meaningfully with locally rooted expertise.
For CoCuDi, Shifting the Center also reflected a central principle of our work: that networks themselves are an important development asset. Bringing people and organizations working in different fields into conversation creates opportunities to exchange knowledge, form new relationships and learn from approaches developed within different communities.
One of the forum’s central conversations, “Who Owns Culture? Localization, Restitution & the Power of Narrative”, brought together Tamar Dekel and Philemon Nyamanga to explore cultural heritage as a living resource for development. Moving from restitution to everyday skills, materials and local knowledge, the conversation asked what development practitioners might discover if, before asking what a community needs from outside, they first ask what knowledge, capacities and cultural assets are already there.
Read the article: Who Owns Culture? Why Cultural Heritage Belongs in the Development Conversation →
Program
09:00 | Registration
09:30 | Welcome & Opening Remarks
Dr. Reut Barak Weekes, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Tamar Dekel, CoCuDi Center
Geoffrey Kiringa Ruku, Cabinet Secretary for Public Service, Human Capital Development and Special Programmes
10:00 | Localization in the New Era of Development
Dr. Reut Barak Weekes, Glocal International Development Program, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
10:30 | Learning from Locally Owned Development Models
Featuring the Green Belt Movement, White Ribbon Alliance Kenya, and Namutumba Innovation Agriculture NGO
11:40 | Coffee Break
12:00 | Who Owns Culture? Localization, Restitution & the Power of Narrative
Tamar Dekel, CoCuDi Center, in conversation with Philemon Nyamanga, Head of the Cultural Heritage Department, National Museums of Kenya
13:00 | Networking Lunch
14:15 | Localizing National Climate and Sustainable Energy Policy
Guided workshop with Yossi Offer, Interloc Development
16:30 | Closing Remarks