Thursday 26 October - Lunchtime
The majority of research on the African climate is through top-down actions initiated, conceived, designed, and led by the global north, often (inadvertently) extractive and/or relegating African scientists as junior partners. Only a minority of global research resources (less than 1%, IPCC AR6) reach African scientists. There is thus an urgent need to rebalance the power dynamic and shift the “power of convening” towards a true partnership of equals between the global-north and global south. The optimal approach is with bottom-up collaborations of African scientists who have the in-situ contextual understanding to design and lead the research – “by Africans for Africans” – and build communities of collaborative practice. Examples of the few actions where this has been implemented (such as with CORDEX Africa) have shown exceptional success and significant benefits in developing African leadership and research capacity, especially among early career researchers.
Building on recent consultations in Africa we seek to expand the dialogue and gain additional perspectives. The focus is on growing Africa leadership and research capacity for transdisciplinary science on climate and society through new modalities for supporting targeted bottom-up collaborative initiatives. We encourage all with an interest in enhancing Africa’s scientific leadership and capacity to come and participate in this interactive event. We seek an inclusive dialogue with southern and northern perspectives.
Name of organizing project/institution: University of Cape Town, University of Witwatersrand, START, WCRP Regional Information for Society, Science for Africa, International Center for Humanitarian Affairs, Rockefeller Foundation.
Convenors: Bruce Hewitson - University of Cape Town and WCRP RifS, Jon Padgham - START, Judy Omumbo - Science for Africa Foundation, Jemimah Maina - International Center for Humanitarian Affairs, Coleen Vogel - University of Witwatersrand, Jordan Fabyanske - Dalberg, Taylor Denson - Rockefeller Foundation.
Targeted audience: Open to all
Attendance: Open to all delegates registered for the WCRP Open Science Conference