How a Corporation-supported program at University of Pretoria’s Future Africa Institute has helped develop postdoctoral researchers working across perspectives, countries, and disciplines to meet the continent’s challenges
For the past three years, twelve researchers from various institutions in six countries across East, West, and Southern Africa and Mauritius have formed part of the Early Career Research Leader Fellowship (ECRLF), an initiative of the University of Pretoria’s Future Africa Institute. The fellowship, funded by Carnegie Corporation of New York, supported the development of African researchers with a focus on addressing Africa’s most urgent development challenges and opportunities and creating the next generation of leaders who will ensure research sustainability and continuity.
A recent report, The Future Africa Early Career Research Leader Fellowship, showcases the stories of each fellow and their individual roles in helping to develop Africa’s research capacity through their transdisciplinary work.
According to Andrea Johnson, recently retired program officer for the Higher Education and Research in Africa (HERA) program, and Alloya Elwadie, HERA program analyst, “The ECRLF actively implemented a future-oriented perspective on skills development to produce a new generation of transformation-minded research leaders by creating capacity to develop interdisciplinary research teams. Together with societal structures beyond academia, these researchers will continue to engage in impactful and responsible research that defies geographic borders and traditional narrow academic disciplines, developing new knowledge to respond more effectively to the risks and opportunities of global environmental change.”
The postdoctoral program not only supported fellows financially but also paired them with established researchers who mentored them in an associated specialized area at the University of Pretoria, setting them up for intellectual and professional independence and development. The academic disciplines represented in ECRLF ranged from animal production and nutrition, epidemiology, agricultural economics, African literature, population studies, cultural studies, bioprocessing, plant chemistry, and history.
The Corporation will continue to support Future Africa through the Future Africa Research Leadership Fellowship (FAR-LeaF), which focuses on the nexus between wellbeing and the social, economic, and natural environment.
Learn about ECRLF’s outcomes and the fellows’ transdisciplinary research by reading the full report The Future Africa Early Career Research Leader Fellowship.
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