The African Union Commission (AUC) has awarded grants to
thirteen consortia of institutions of higher learnings to serve as Regional
Implementing Centres for the Global
Monitoring for Environment and Security and Africa (GMES and Africa)
Support Programme, reports NaijaAgroNet.
The award
ceremony, NaijaAgroNet gathered,
would hold on the margins of the 5th AU-EU Summit in Abidjan, Cote d`Ivoire.
Also, NaijaAgroNet recalled that following
a call for proposals in May 2017, a number of African institutions operating in
the areas of water, natural resources, marine and coastal areas, applied for
the GMES and Africa Support Programme Grants.
The Communications
Officer, GMES & Africa at AUC, Mr. Adiatou Fattey in a press
statement made available to NaijaAgroNet, noted that in order to evaluate the applications and select
the most suitable consortia of institutions that submitted proposals, the
African Union Commission instituted a committee supported by a team of
assessors comprising African earth observation experts.
The 13
consortia of institutions were finally selected and the award marks the
official announcement of their selection.
1. Central
Africa: Agence Gabonaise d'Etudes et d'Observations Spatiale (AGEOS) and
Commission Internationale du Bassin Congo-Oubangui-Sangha (CICOS) for Water and
natural resources service.
2. East
Africa:
IGAD Climate
Prediction and Application Centre (ICPAC) and Regional Centre for Mapping off
Resources for Development (RCMRD) for Water and natural resources service
Mauritius
Oceanography Institute (MOI) for Marine and coastal areas service
3.North
Africa:
National
Authority for Remote Sensing & Space Sciences (NARSS) for marine and
coastal area service
Observatoire
du Sahara et du Sahel (OSS) for water and natural ressources service
4. Southern
Africa:
Council for
Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) for marine and coastal areas service
Southern
African Development Community Climate Services Centre (SADC-CSC) and Southern
African Science Service Centre for Climate Change and Adaptive Land Management
(SASSCAL) for water and natural resources service
5. West
Africa
Centre de
Suivi Ecologique (CSE) and Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria
(CSSTE-Obafemi) for water and natural resources service University
of Ghana (UG) for Marine and coastal areas service.
At the award
ceremony, the Commissioner for Human Resources, Science and Technology at the
African Union Commission, Professor Sarah Anyang Agbor, felicitated the
successful institutions on their selection, which she said was based on their
experience and proven capacities.
She implored them to deliver the goods, and
promised the African Union Commission’s unflinching support.
Isaac Oyimah/ED, Ops
