The purpose of this Project was to strengthen HEIs in East-Africa as developmentally responsive institutions by enhancing curriculum development, pedagogical approach and capacity of staff in the area of mathematics education and teacher preparation. The invigoration and modernisation of teacher training and the upgrading of curricula was meant to increase the level and enrollment of mathematics education, give a push forward to the education of mathematics teachers and support the universities' ability to embark on development projects with the surrounding society, industry and public governance.

Team

Matti Heiliö, Matylda Jablonska-Sabuka, Tuomo Kauranne, Heikki Haario, Miika Tolonen

The two-year FinCEAL pilot project aimed to enhance cooperation between research and science policy communities in Finland, Europe, Africa, and Latin America and the Caribbean by networking the Finnish research community and by supporting their participation in bi-regional research projects and science policy processes. FinCEAL was an initiative funded by the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture and implemented by UniPID, the Finnish University Partnership for International Development. FinCEAL activities were focused on the following thematic areas, derived from the European Union's bi-regional science, technology and innovation policy processes: Africa – Food Security, Information Society, Health, Climate Change and Renewable Energy; LAC – ICT for Societal Challenges, Bioeconomy, Biodiversity and Climate Change, Renewable Energy and Health.

Team

Eva Kagiri, Kajsa Ekroos, Melissa Plath

The ENhHANCE project proposes enhancements for SECE-AAiT and CoICT-UDSM in engineering education, research capacity and industry outreach through collaborative activities with COMNET-Aalto. The COMNET-Aalto department is a long-established and leading unit for research and education in Finland in the area of networking and communications engineering, and plans to leverage that extensive knowledge and experience for the benefit of the partner HEIs (SECE-AAiT and CoICT-UDSM).

Team

Prof. Riku Jäntti (Aalto), Prof. Jyri Hämäläinen (Aalto), Dr. Edward Mutafungwa (Aalto), Beneyam Haile (Aalto), Dr. Dereje Hailemariam (AAiT), Dr. Eneyew Adugna (AAiT), Prof. Henry Kundaeli (CoICT-UDSM), Dr. Honest C. Kimaro (CoICT-UDSM)

Marketing channels of agricultural surplus is important for improving food security in most African countries. The cooperative business form offers one way for smallholder and intermediate size farmers to sell their surplus. Twelve Tanzanian cooperatives were studied by semi-structured interviews to find out if the cooperative business model can reduce poverty and address food security. Four types of cooperatives were identified: traditional cooperatives, reforming cooperatives, new cooperatives and co-operatives with some innovations. Both cases of poorly working unions and more recent success stories were found. Features characterizing good cooperative work in Tanzania were identified. Recommendations on policy level how to support cooperative action is given.

Team

John Sumelius; Faustine K. Bee; Suleman A. Chambo; Shimelles Tenaw; Stefan Bäckman,

The main objectives of the cooperation are: • to develop a study module and associated curriculum on sustainability and clean technologies • to design and implement staff/expert training for sustainability and clean technologies • to develop UEM capacity to provide services for and to establish strong links with industry, national sustainable development efforts and initiatives and other HEIs in the field of sustainability and clean technologies

Team

Prof. Andrade Egas, Dr. Natasha Ribeiro, MSc. (Tech.) Mikko Martikka, MSc. (Tech.) Sakari Toivakainen,

To identify technological readiness of developing countries for E-Learning, to estimate the metrics for measuring technological readiness of Nigerian Universities Undergraduates for Finnish E-Learning Courses, to report what undergraduates say about their readiness for E-Learning which can assist them achieve the academic outcomes, to track trends of student behaviors, attitudes and perception about E-Learning, benchmark what devices of theirs, they prefer for E-Learning studies and to find out which courses would be most attractive to Nigerian university students via E-learning and finally to establish which resources, such as staff and facilities that would be needed to support E-Learning

Team

CAAST-Net Plus is a network of 25 partner organisations from all over Europe and sub-Saharan Africa, working together to support bi-regional cooperation in research and innovation. Building on the activities and outputs of the CAAST-Net project (2008-2012), CAAST-Net Plus aims to: Encourage more and better bi-regional STI cooperation for enhanced outcomes around topics of mutual interest, and particularly in relation to the global societal challenges of climate change, food security and health. Foster discussion among stakeholders for gathering informed opinion and experience about the bi-regional cooperation process, formulating and disseminating it in such a way as to be admissible to the formal bi-regional STI policy dialogue process and to programme owners. ?Through informing the bi-regional policy dialogue for mutual learning and awareness, through building support for coordinated and innovative approaches to bilateral funding of bi-regional cooperation around global challenges, brokering the public-private relationship to foster improved uptake and translation of bi-regional research partnership outputs into innovative technologies, good and services, and through dedicated mechanisms to encourage bi-regional research partnerships, CAAST-Net Plus will make invaluable contributions to the quality and scope of the Africa-Europe STI relationship for mutual benefit.

Team

Melissa Plath