2016•07•08     Algeria

On 30 May, the Directors’ and Coordination meeting took place at the Pan African University Institute of Water and Energy Sciences, including Climate Change (PAUWES) at the PAUWES project closing event in Tlemcen, Algeria. The Higher Education Consortium, consisting of the Center for Development Research (ZEF), University of Bonn, the Institute for Technology and Resources Management in the Tropics and Subtropics (ITT) at the TH Cologne – University of Applied Sciences, the United Nations University Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS), the Deutsche Gesellschaft fuer Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) representatives, came together to reflect and to look ahead.

Several representatives of the Higher Education Consortium and donors attended the meeting. Prof. Dr. Jakob Rhyner, Director of UNU-EHS, and Dr. Erick Tambo, Associate Academic Officer in the Edusphere section of UNU-EHS participated. The meeting started with a review of the cooperation project followed by discussion and reflection of achieved results combined with the definition of steps forward for finalization in the current phase. The new technical cooperation phase II from 2017 was discussed, taking into account the structure, key activities, priorities and lessons learned. In addition to an outline on the pending German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, BMBF) project and a call for proposals aimed at sub-Saharan Africa by the same Ministry, further options for cooperation were conferred.

The review of activities of the work plan with a focus on designing deliverables until the end of the project as well as a discussion on open issues related to the master theses of the first cohort of students was conducted a day after the Directors’ and Coordination Meeting with the presence of the Coordinator of the Higher Education Consortium, PAUWES and donor representatives.