By Edward Nawotka

The Hay Festival folks have been busy this month, hosting festivals in both the Maldives and Kenya, with yet another planned for Kerala in November.

The Maldives has been a multi-party democracy for only two years and the country’s president has set his country a target of becoming carbon neutral within ten years. Accordingly, the event in the Maldives — which took place this past weekend — focused on climate change and brought several dozen politicians, thinkers and authors to the archipelago for talks, including Tim Smit, Ian McEwan, Peter Godwin, Jung Chang, Monty Don and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and local Maldivian writers Ogaru Waheed Kalaavehi, Habeeba Hussain Habeeb and Mohamed Niyaz Tedry.

You can get a run-down on what was said here on the Festival’s blog as well as attend a “virtual festival,” (sponsored by the Environmental Justice Foundation) featuring a dozen videos, here.

Earlier this month. second annual Storymoja Hay Festival took place in Nairobi, Kenya this October. A collaboration between the UK’s Hay Festival and Nairobi’s Storymoja writing and publishing collective. Founded in 2007, the collective has the stated aim of publishing East African writers “to a world class standard” and “reaching the widest possible audience.” We’re written about them frequently in the past, including a profile of the organization here.

You can get the flavor of the event by visiting the Festival’s blog.

Finally, coming up November 12-14, the Hay Festivals are launching an inaugural event in Kerala, India — yet another beautiful location. According to the Web site, it promises “around forty events over three days and evenings, with a mix of international and Indian participants.” Among those scheduled to appear are Vikram Seth, Tishani Doshi and Bob Geldof.