Capacity Building: AACFP

The African Climate Change Fellowship Program (ACCFP) offers experiential learning, education, research and training opportunities to African professionals, researchers and graduate students that will build their capabilities for advancing and applying knowledge for climate change adaptation in Africa. Participating Fellows receive small grants to undertake Policy Fellowships, Doctoral Research Fellowships, Post-Doctoral Fellowships and Teaching Fellowships. The Fellowship grants enable Fellows to visit other institutions for 2 to 12 months. The program is intended to benefit and create stronger linkages between the host and home institutions of participating Fellows. Home institutions must be located in Africa, while host institutions may be located in or outside of Africa, with preference given first to African institutions and secondly to institutions outside of Africa that demonstrate a commitment to enabling Fellows to pursue careers in Africa.

Applicants selected for Fellowship awards receive a small grant to cover costs of travel, accommodation, subsistence and other costs needed to undertake a project, of their own design, that applies knowledge for and/or advances climate change adaptation in Africa. Grant sizes range from $8000 to $35,000 depending on the type and duration of a Fellowship and estimated reasonable costs. Four types of Fellowships are offered:

For more information about the ACCFP and the different Fellowship types, please visit http://accfp.pass-africa.org.

A survey of institutions was conducted in early 2007 to identify organizations that are interested in participating in the ACCFP as host or home institutions, their capacity needs that are relevant to climate change adaptation, and the types of Fellowship activities that would benefit them. Over 250 organizations from 43 countries in and outside Africa responded to the survey. A searchable database of survey responses is now available online at http://survey.pass-africa.org.

A Workshop to Assess Need and Opportunities for the ACCFP was held 11-13 March 2008 in Dar es Salaam, with simultaneous French-English translation, and was attended by 76 participants from 30 countries. Participants in the workshop were unanimous in their view that there is a priority need for programs to build capacity for climate change adaptation in Africa and enthusiastic in their expectation that the ACCFP will make an important contribution. The workshop generated numerous recommendations for the design and implementation of the ACCFP, many of which have been acted on.

A Call for Applications for the inaugural round of the ACCFP was released in August 2008. The deadline for applications was 17 September 2008. Over 300 applications were extensively reviewed and by November 2008, 48 Fellows from 19 countries were selected as awardees for the ACCFP Program.

ACCFP Infomational Brochure, including Awardees published.

2009/2010 ACCFP Awardee Brochure

Program Partners and Sponsors

The African Climate Change Fellowship Program is coordinated by the global change SysTem for Analysis, Research and Training (START; www.start.org), the Institute of Resource Assessment (IRA) at the University of Dar es Salaam (www.ira.udsm.ac.tz), and the African Academy of Sciences (AAS; www.aasciences.org). The International Development Research Centre (IDRC) with the UK's Department for International Development (DRID) provides financial support for the Fellowship program under its Climate Change Adaptation in Africa program (www.idrc.ca/en/ev-94424-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html).

For Further Information:

Please visit the Pan-African START Secretariat’s website at http://www.pass-africa.org/.

Or Contact:

Prof. Pius Yanda, Director of Pan-African START Secretariat (PASS) and Director of the Institute for Resource Assessment at the University of Dar es Salaam, yanda@ira.udsm.ac.tz

Dr. Thomas Egwang, Executive Director, African Academy of Sciences, t.egwang@aasciences.org

Clark Seipt, International START Secretariat, cseipt@agu.org