Stakeholders and experts in Science and Technology from Africa and the around the world have gathered at the South African Astronomical Observatory in Cape Town for an interdisciplinary workshop on “Science for Development” jointly hosted by the International Science Council’s (ISC) Regional Office for Africa (ROA) and the International Astronomical Union’s (IAU) Office of Astronomy for Development (OAD), both supported by the Department of Science and Innovation and National Research Foundation.

The event scheduled from 30-31st of this month, serves as a platform for a network of interactions, and seeks to bring together experts from both science and development fields, especially from across Africa to discuss and find common grounds regarding socio-economic development; stimulate collaborations and partnerships between scientists and development experts or practitioners, and generate ideas and plans for interdisciplinary science-for-development projects, which could be incubated and piloted within the OAD or ROA networks, and potentially expanded globally.

With about 100 attendees, the event will feature panels of discussions on building resilience in the local development of communities in the context of climate change, coastal mapping imperatives to the socio-economic development of rural coastal communities, climate change; addressing Sustainable Development Goals through biowalk with bioproducts, and science-for-development projects “on the ground” using Remote Sensing Technology.

Other topics to be explored at the workshop include Remote Sensing for Forecasting Emergence of Edible Insects, synergizing Science for Suicide Prevention –Artificial Intelligence and Medicine, Making our farmers climate-resilient – a Science-for-Development project from the island of Mauritius and lots more.

For more information on the event programme, click here

The workshop is expected to bolster collaborations between scientists and experts from different fields related to development, generate tangible ideas for interdisciplinary science-for-development projects that can be implemented via the ISC, ROA and OAD networks and fundraising plans to support project ideas.