Germany's Foreign Minister Ms. Annalena Baerbock visits ZEF-partner Abdou Moumouni University in Niamey, Niger.

Annalena Baerbock talking to students in Niamey, Niger.

Niamey, April 13, 2022. During her tour in West Africa, Germany’s Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ms. Annalena Baerbock, paid a visit to the Abdou Moumouni University (UAM) in Niamey, Niger, today. The Abdou Moumouni University has been a longstanding ZEF-partner in its Capacity Development and Research actitivities in West Africa.

A 55-member delegation, including Niger’s State Secretary of Foreign Affairs, members of Niger’s and Germany’s parliaments, German and African journalists, as well as experts and industry representatives from Germany accompanied the minister, who attended a conference on climate change and security taking place at the Faculty of Sciences and Technology (FAST) of the Abdou Moumouni University. Professor Rabani Adamou, pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and International Affairs at Abdou Moumouni and Director of the West African Center for Sustainable Rural Transformation (WAC-SRT) in Niger has coordinated the visit with his team at FAST.

Ms. Baerbock visited different research and capacity-building cooperation projects, such as the ZEF-led and DAAD-funded project West African Centre for Sustainable Rural Transformation (project lead: ZEF senior researcher Wolfram Laube) and the ZEF-initiated and BMBF-funded project West African Science Service Centre on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use (WASCAL).

At the event at Abdou Moumouni University in Niamey, the Minister was also introduced to students of the Climate and Sustainable Development Action’s Club (CSDAC), an initiative of students of the project West African Centre for Sustainable Rural Transformation.

Segbedji Geraldo Favi, co-founder of CSDAC and WAC-SRT alumnus, presented CSDAC’s work and actions to the Minister and gave a speech on behalf of the Abdou Moumouni University’s students. In his speech to the minister and audience, Mr. Favi cited Nelson Mandela, South Africa's late President, who once said: "Educaton is the most powerful weapon which can be used to change the world".  He added that Germany has also understood the value of education and has been investing in Africa's capacity, especially the youth from West Africa, for years now. As a result of this determined and continuous support from Germany, a lot of progress has been made in terms of knowledge transfer, enhancement of the lectures and students' capacity, and contribution to scientific knowledge.
Read Segbedji Geraldo Favi's full speech here.

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Contact: Segbedji Geraldo Favi, favi.segbedji@yahoo.com. After finishing his Master studies within the West African Centre for Sustainable Rural Transformation at Abdou Moumouni University (AMU) in Niger last year, he started his PhD studies on the topic of Water-Food- Energy nexus in the WASCAL Doctoral Research Program "Climate Change and Energy" at AMU in Niamey.

Watch our interview with Geraldo Favi (October 2021) on youtube here

More news items about CSDAC: here (December 2020), here and here (February 2022)
and read the blog post (December 2021) by CSDAC students Geraldo Favi and Otekpo Armel about field research in Niger here.

Photo: David Agbo, Abdou Moumouni University