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The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation is hosting researchers from southern Africa and Germany at an interregional meeting in Pretoria, South Africa. Participants from an array countries and research fields will share information about opportunities for and challenges involved in conducting research collaboration on an equal basis. How should research collaboration between southern Africa and Germany be organised in the future? And how can the Humboldt Network contribute to societal, ecological and technological transformation processes?
The colloquium aims to promote long-term partnerships and develop innovative solutions to global issues. Keynote lectures by Humboldtians will be complemented by workshops and discussions to intensify the collaboration between researchers in the Humboldt Network. The participants hail from Botswana, Eswatini, Germany, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Humboldt Foundation’s engagement in Africa
Exchange with aspiring, dynamic science systems in the so-called Global South is a strategic focus of the Humboldt Foundation. Over the years, it has built and expanded a global network of Humboldt alumni by nurturing outstanding researchers through its provision of research fellowships and awards and has supported long-term collaboration between Africa and Germany. These collaborative activities include for example the Humboldt Research Hubs in Benin, Cameroon, Republic of the Congo, Nigeria and Zimbabwe which serve to strengthen scientific capabilities and foster young researchers. The Research Hubs look for solutions to current and future pandemics and their effects.
The Humboldt Foundation has also filled ten professorships at AIMS (African Institute for Mathematical Sciences) network locations..
Journalists are welcome to attend the colloquium!
Opening ceremony: Thursday, 6 March 2025, 4 p.m.
Venue: CT Hotel (formerly Sheraton Pretoria Hotel), 643 Corner of Stanza Bopape (Church) & Wessels St., Arcadia, Pretoria
Greetings:
- Thomas Hesse, interim Secretary General, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
- Andreas Peschke, German Ambassador to South Africa
- Francis Petersen, Vice-Chancellor, University of Pretoria
- Christian W. W. Pirk, General Secretary, Academy of Science of South
- Abdullahi Yusuf, Ambassador Scientist of the Humboldt Foundation in South Africa
- Jean Christoph Sonnekus, President, North-Eastern Chapter of the Alexander von Humboldt Association of Southern Africa
Lectures:
- Juan Bornman, Professor of Augmentative and Alternative Communication, University of Pretoria: “Empowering voices: using Augmentative and Alternative Communication to prevent abuse and ensure access to justice for persons with communication disabilities”
- Bart Thomma, Humboldt Professor for Evolutionary Microbiology, University of Cologne: “Microbial warfare: pathogen strategies to cause disease”
Friday, 7 March, starting 9 a.m.
- Ernst van der Wal, Stellenbosch University, South Africa: “Small: scale and strategies of subversion in (South) African visual culture”
- Molly Manyonganise, Zimbabwe Open University, Zimbabwe: “The absence of women’s voices in ecumenical responses to political transitions in Zimbabwe”
- Rima Beesoo, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, France: “Insight from my Humboldt Research Fellowship on the antioxidant potential of a tropical jellyfish”
- Abdullahi Yusuf, University of Pretoria, South Africa: “From Africa to Germany and back for honey bees and science in the footsteps of Alexander von Humboldt”
Followed by: Workshops and discussions in specialist groups.
Conference dinner, 7 p.m.
Lize Kriel, University of Pretoria, South Africa: “German-South African missionary encounters – possible future meanings of memories, archives, sites”
Saturday, 8 March, starting 9 a.m.
- Percy M. Chimwamurombe, Namibia University of Science and Technology, Namibia: “Current challenges in Southern Africa: opportunities to harness collaboration”
- Alida Anel du Plessis, Stellenbosch University, South Africa: “When (urban) law and other sciences meet: the value of mixed research, methodologies and collaboration”
Followed by: World Café for networking
Every year, the Humboldt Foundation organises up to two major colloquia abroad to which all the alumni from the respective country or region are invited. The colloquium in Pretoria is being financed by Germany’s Federal Foreign Office.
Every year, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation enables more than 2,000 researchers from all over the world to spend time conducting research in Germany. The Foundation maintains an interdisciplinary network of well over 30,000 Humboldtians in more than 140 countries around the world – including 61 Nobel Prize winners.