African Partners Research Articles

Redefining South Korean ODA (Official Development Assistance): How Technical Aid Emerges from its Contexts (1954-1965)

This paper considers the origins of South Korean ODA (official development assistance), working through the lens of KOICA’s (Korea International Cooperation Agency) two main predecessor institutions in the early 1960s. In contrast to KOICA (1991-prsent), associated with a rich Korea, this earlier period was dominated by small-scale efforts at outreach with neighboring countries, especially in Southeast Asia and Africa.In this context, two arguments emerge. First, Korean aid began earlier than is generally assumed, with the first outreach to African partners coming under discussion as early as 1960. Second, when the nation began its official in-country workshops a few years later, these were heavily influenced by the experiences Koreans had themselves undergone with the US in the form of “third-county training,” in which the US paired its partners to speed up the transfer of knowledge. In brief, Korean aid at its start point took place most frequently with new post-colonial partners, whether for diplomatic recognition, or for the exchange of knowledge, and went on to shape a new network as KODCO (Korean Overseas Development Corporation, 1965-1991) became a reality in the mid-1960s.

Rapid regional mobile laboratory response and genomic monkeypox virus (MPXV) surveillance in seven East African Community partner states, August 2024: preparedness activities for the ongoing outbreak.

The East African Community (EAC) is experiencing an unprecedented, emerging mpox outbreak since July 2024 in five of eight partner states. We highlight rapid regional response measures, initiated August 2024 coordinated by EAC: field deployment of six mobile laboratories in Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, South Sudan to high-risk areas, donation of one mobile laboratory to Democratic Republic of the Congo and genomic monkeypox virus (MPXV) surveillance support. These interventions aim to limit local mpox spread and support international containment.

Motivations for International Open InnovatioN (IOI): the perspective of Quebec SMES in Africa

Objective: This research aims to understand the motivations for SMEs from developed countries to engage in open innovation (OI) projects with partners in developing countries. Methodology: We adopted a qualitative approach and studied the case of 16 SMEs from Quebec that successfully carried out OI projects within African countries. Relevance: Despite the growing body of research on OI within SMEs, the international perspective of OI still needs to be explored. In particular, the context of developing countries has received limited attention, especially the motivations for SMEs from developed countries to undertake OI projects in developing countries. Main results: The results show that OI projects with African partners allow SMEs to integrate into African markets and acquire knowledge different from that of developed economies. These partnerships strengthen the overall organizational capacity of the SME beyond the acquisition of specific knowledge related to the innovation project. They also include social objectives to improve local communities living conditions. Theoretical contributions: By addressing the calls for research on OI within developing countries, this article expands the scope of OI in this context. It also contributes to the resource-based view theory by identifying integration within foreign networks as the main strategic resource, motivating SMEs from developed countries to initiate OI projects in developing countries. Managerial contributions: The study provides insights to SMEs from developed countries about the various reasons for implementing OI projects with partners in developing countries. It also offers them tailored advice to carry out such projects successfully.

Chem4Energy: a consortium of the Royal Society Africa Capacity-Building Initiative.

The Africa Capacity-Building Initiative is a Royal Society programme funded by the former UK Department for International Development to develop collaborative research between scientists in sub-Saharan Africa and the UK. Initially, four institutions were involved in the Chem4Energy consortium: Cardiff University in the UK and three African partners, the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana, the University of Namibia and the University of Botswana, soon also including the Botswana International University of Science and Technology. The Chem4Energy research programme focused on 'New materials for a sustainable energy future: linking computation with experiment', aiming to deploy the synergy between state-of-the-art computational and experimental techniques to design and optimize new catalysts and semiconductor materials for renewable energy applications, based on materials that are abundant and readily available in African countries. The Chem4Energy consortium has achieved ambitious research goals, graduated seven PhD students and delivered a high-quality cross-disciplinary training programme in materials science and simulation techniques relevant to renewable energy applications. Since 2021, the extended consortium, including North-West University and the Centre for High-Performance Computing in South Africa, has remained active through an annual Chem4Energy conference series, with the sixth meeting taking place in Namibia in April 2025.

Comparative Advantage of Trade in Food Products among the Selected East African Community Partner States: Implication for Policy Formulation

Despite the potential benefits of regional trade, economic disparities among East African Community (EAC) member states persist. This study investigated the relationship between trade openness, comparative advantage in food trade, and economic performance within the EAC, focusing on Tanzania, Kenya, and Uganda. The study adopted export data from the United Nations Commodity Trade Statistics Database, the World Bank, and the International Trade Centre, as well as GDP data from the Bank of Tanzania and the National Bureau of Statistics. Data were analysed through descriptive statistics, causality analysis, Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA), and vector autoregressive model. Findings reveal a positive impact of trade openness on Tanzania’s economy but negative impacts on Kenya and Uganda, suggesting Tanzania benefits from EAC integration while Kenya and Uganda face trade challenges. The causality analysis shows that Tanzania’s economic performance drives food exports, trade openness impacts Kenya’s economic performance significantly, and Uganda sees a reciprocal link between economic growth and food exports; however, trade openness does not significantly affect Ugandan economic growth. The analysis of the Balassa index indicates Kenya’s food export advantage, a decline in Uganda’s export advantage since 1996, and Tanzania’s lack of export advantage with potential for improvement. The study recommends cautiously implementing trade openness policies within the EAC to prevent trade distortions and currency devaluation.

Students as co-researchers: participatory methods for decolonising research in teaching and learning in higher education

ABSTRACT This paper focuses on the potential, challenges, and limits of participatory, narrative and multimodal research methods as contributions to decolonising research on understanding student experiences of teaching and learning in higher education. Drawing on Fraser’s social justice concepts of participatory parity, redistribution, recognition, and representation, we argue that methodologies and methods for researching students’ experiences need to redress power imbalances implicit in many existing approaches. We suggest how participatory methodologies can be combined with narrative inquiry and multimodal methods where students research their own lives and contexts. We critically reflect on an international study based in South Africa with South African and UK partners involving 65 undergraduate students from rural backgrounds who participated as co-researchers over 12 months. We highlight decolonial debates in relation to participatory research, before outlining our methodological approach and interrogating the potential, limitations, and future possibilities of co-researcher methodologies for decolonising student-focused research in higher education

United States – Kenyan Asymmetry in Counterterrorism Cooperation: An Assessment of the Efforts of the United States and Kenya in East Africa

On 11 September 2001, the world witnessed a drastic change in the global security landscape that influenced the dynamics of United States counterterrorism. The United States expanded its global alliances, including its financial assistance and cooperation scope, in East Africa as well. A fundamental transformation in the United States Defence Foreign Policy towards Africa was marked by a growing reliance by the United States on African partners, such as Kenya. Despite visible power disparities between the United States and Kenyan asymmetric relations, the two states set an unmatched counterterrorism partnership in East Africa – even with the growing criticism of the United States militarisation in some parts of Africa, such as in the Sahel region, which remains prone to coups despite enduring counterterrorism interventions by the United States. What is particularly interesting is how the asymmetric relations between the United States and Kenya enhanced a stable and multidimensional implementation of counterterrorism in East Africa. The dynamics of these asymmetric relations on counterterrorism demystify the perception that asymmetric relations between powerful and weak states are inherently unstable. Employing secondary data, the study on which this article reports, sought to deconstruct such rhetoric by conceptualising asymmetry whilst identifying five main conceptualisations of asymmetry theory that characterises the asymmetric relations between the United States and Kenya. Thereafter, by taking stock of the multidimensional efforts by the United States and Kenya, it is argued that triangular asymmetries are the significant force multipliers of stability and normalcy in asymmetric relations.

A political economy analysis of changes and continuities in Iran–Africa trade relations: a case of South–South dependency?

This paper provides a political economy analysis of the bilateral trade relations and patterns of exchange that existed between Iran and Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) from 1962 to 2021. The paper contributes to the growing literature on Iran–Africa relations by empirically delineating not just the changes, but also the continuities between Iran and its African trading partners before and after the Iranian Revolution. It also adds nuance to the broader scholarship on South–South cooperation by showing the disparity between the rhetoric of South–South solidarity and reciprocity between Iran and SSA, on one side, and their low and fluctuating trade volumes, on the other. These volumes resulted from historical inertia or path dependency and structural factors, including trade complementarities and geopolitical conditions, more than demographic, cultural, or religious realities. They were also shaped by the agency and decision-making of Iranian and African leaders and officials regarding the extent to economically engage with each other.

Ebola Virus Disease Outbreaks: Lessons Learned From Past and Facing Future Challenges.

The purpose of this review is to examine African Ebola outbreaks from their first discovery to the present, to determine how the medical and public health response has changed and identify the causes for those changes. We sought to describe what is now known about the epidemiology and spread of Ebola virus disease (EVD) from the significant outbreaks that have occurred and outbreak control methods applied under often challenging circumstances. Given the substantial role that the U.S. Government and the U.S. DoD have played in the 2014 to 2016 West African Ebola outbreak, the role of the DoD and the U.S. Africa Command in controlling EVD is described. A descriptive method design was used to collect and analyze all available Ebola outbreak literature using the PubMed database. An initial literature search was conducted by searching for, obtaining, and reading original source articles on all major global Ebola outbreaks. To conduct a focused search, we used initial search terms "Ebola outbreak," "Ebola virus disease," "Ebola response," "Ebola countermeasures," and also included each country's name where Ebola cases are known to have occurred. From the 4,673 unique articles obtained from this search and subsequent article title review, 307 articles were identified for potential inclusion. Following abstract and article review, 45 original source articles were used to compile the history of significant Ebola outbreaks. From this compilation, articles focused on each respective subsection of this review to delineate and describe the history of EVD and response, identifying fundamental changes, were obtained and incorporated. We present known Ebola virus and disease attributes, including a general description, seasonality and location, transmission capacity, clinical symptoms, surveillance, virology, historical EVD outbreaks and response, international support for Ebola outbreak response, U.S. DoD support, medical countermeasures supporting outbreak response, remaining gaps to include policy limitations, regional instability, climate change, migration, and urbanization, public health education and infrastructure, and virus persistence and public awareness. The health and societal impacts of EVD on Africa has been far-reaching, with about 35,000 cases and over 15,000 deaths, with small numbers of cases spreading globally. However, the history of combatting EVD reveals that there is considerable hope for African nations to quickly and successfully respond to Ebola outbreaks, through use of endemic resources including Africa CDC and African Partner Outbreak Response Alliance and the U.S. Africa Command with greater DoD reachback. Although there remains much to be learned about the Ebola virus and EVD including whether the potential for novel strains to become deadly emerging infections, invaluable vaccines, antivirals, and public health measures are now part of the resources that can be used to combat this disease.

Evaluation of a Multisectoral Health Security Alliance Program Through Perceptions of Member States: African Partnership Outbreak Response Alliance (APORA).

U.S. DoD global health engagements offer opportunities for strategic engagement and building capability in collaboration with foreign military and civilian counterparts. Global health engagement activities can take the form of health security alliances and allow the USA and its allies and partners to prepare for, mitigate, and respond to emerging biothreats and other harmful health events that may negatively impact national security. One such example is the African Partnership Outbreak Response Alliance (APORA), which was designed to expand African Partner Nation militaries' infectious disease outbreak response capabilities. This publication evaluates the development, implementation, and outcomes of APORA to better understand the program's effectiveness in developing Partner Nation medical capabilities and the efficacy of health security alliances more broadly. Key informant interviews, focus groups, and questionnaires were used to collect responses from a sample of participants who attended an in-person APORA event in May 2022. The research team conducted thematic analysis of all responses to identify common themes and sub-themes in participants' perspectives and to elucidate findings and recommendations for future endeavors. The analysis determined that participants attended the APORA event primarily to disseminate and apply knowledge, skills, and abilities gained at the event to their own health system structures. Overall, participants indicated that APORA contributed to their countries' military medical and civilian cooperation, as well as their countries' military medical capabilities. Longer-term partners (i.e., 4+ years of APORA membership) agreed more strongly with these sentiments; newer partners (i.e., 1-3 years of APORA membership) were more likely to be neutral or agree to some extent. Participants also valued the opportunity to solidify global, regional, local, and peer partnerships and considered the ability to create partnerships of great importance to their countries' national health security. Language barriers were often listed as a hindrance to event participation and the overall integration of a regional health system response. Participants also cited resource scarcity, network erosion (particularly because of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic), and a lack of disseminating and communicating value-add in how APORA could/is providing to their member countries' health systems as key barriers. As a whole, these findings support APORA's objectives to develop and leverage partnerships to support medical capacity building, promote collaboration between military and civilian sectors, and increase access to opportunities and financial resources. Further evaluation is required to capture additional civilian perspectives while continuing to expand upon military perspectives in order to produce more generalizable findings. That said, this study enables key stakeholders to understand how to strengthen and expand future alliances to improve both health and security outcomes.

Harnessing the potential of African youth for transforming health research in Africa

Africa faces a significant burden of infectious diseases, including Malaria and HIV/AIDS, along with an increasing prevalence of non-infectious diseases such as diabetes and cancer. This dual health challenge is amplified by socioeconomic difficulties, restricted access to healthcare, and lifestyle changes, thus present unique scientific needs. Effectively addressing these issues requires a skilled scientific workforce adept in comprehensive healthcare strategies. This analysis explores the critical landscape of health research in Africa, emphasizing the unique opportunity presented by the continent’s youthful population, projected to reach almost 1 billion by 2050. The youth’s innovative potential and fresh perspectives offer a chance to overcome development barriers in health research. Nevertheless, challenges such as under-resourced education, limited research training, inadequate mentorship, and funding difficulties persist. This paper urgently calls upon African leaders, international partners, and stakeholders to prioritize health research, mobilize funding, forge strategic partnerships, and empower the youth as essential steps to capitalize on the continent’s dynamic youth for breakthrough health outcomes. Such investments are vital not just for health but for the overall economic, social, and strategic growth of the continent. Through shared responsibility and a united effort, the potential of African youth can be harnessed, leading to transformative research, improved health outcomes, and a prosperous future. This perspective represents the collective voice of passionate young researchers and advocates across Africa, calling for a new era of health research on the continent.

African domestic supply booms in value chains of fruits, vegetables, and animal products fueled by spontaneous clusters of SMEs

AbstractThere is an international consensus that Africans consume less fruits and vegetables (FV), and animal products (AP) than they need for adequate nutrition, and that production and supply chains of these products are constrained. Yet, in this paper, we show that despite these problems, there is a lot of dynamism in demand and supply of these nutrient‐dense products in Africa: (1) macro evidence of “domestic supply booms"—with supply growing as fast as or faster than in Asia and Latin America; (2) only 2–4% of FV, and 10% of AP consumption in Africa is imported, and only about 1–2% of the output of FV and AP is exported: the supply booms have thus been overwhelming domestically sourced, not imported; (3) micro evidence of substantial shares of consumption of FV and AP in total food consumption, similar to Asia's; (4) evidence of rapid development of spontaneous clusters of farms and off‐farm SMEs (output wholesalers, logistics, processors, and agro‐dealers supporting farmers). These clusters are important in fueling the supply booms. Illustrative cases from Ethiopia, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Zambia are presented. We recommend that African governments and international partners: (1) internalize the fact that these spontaneous clusters are forming and already fueling supply booms; (2) note that important drivers of the booms have been government investments in wholesale markets, roads, and other infrastructure like electrification, and agricultural research/extension; (3) leverage and support existing spontaneous clusters and help new ones to form by greatly increasing those three types of public investments.

Introduction of Smallholder Horticulture Empowerment and Promotion (SHEP) approach as an innovative agricultural extension model

Agricultural extension in developing countries faces many challenges. The main challenge for public institutions, the implementers of agricultural extension services, is that they have weak implementation systems to support farmers. On the other hand, the main challenge faced by beneficiary farmers is low agricultural productivity and income. Against this backdrop, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) launched an initiative to promote “agriculture as a business” by strengthening the agricultural extension systems of developing country governments, beginning with a technical cooperation project implemented in Kenya from 2006 to 2009. The agricultural extension method developed in this project is the Smallholder Horticulture Empowerment and Promotion (SHEP) approach. The SHEP approach is supported by two theoretical pillars: promoting farming as a business (economics) and empowering and motivating people (psychology). A series of activities fulfilling these two pillars is the innovative originality of the SHEP approach. These activities are practiced according to four steps to promote market-oriented agriculture while motivating smallholders to improve their farming operations. In Kenya, horticultural income of target farmers increased through the practice of “grow to sell.” Following this result, the SHEP approach has spread across Africa through the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD), benefitting 256,546 small-scale farmers in 30 countries to date. In countries where the SHEP approach was implemented, in addition to the outcomes of increased horticultural productivity and income, many impacts were identified that contributed to improved farmers’ livelihoods, including repairing or building houses, purchasing mobile phones and vehicles, installing electricity in homes and funding children’s education. Since TICAD VII in 2019, JICA has been working with African governments, development partners, private companies and relevant organizations to promote the transition to profitable agriculture through the SHEP approach with the goal of achieving better lives for one million smallholders by 2030. This has led to the utilization of the SHEP approach in various forms, and its effectiveness and versatility has been recognized. However, inadequate government agricultural extension budgets and farmers’ high expectations for the provision of agricultural inputs raise the bar for intervention in the SHEP approach. The SHEP approach, however, is not a “panacea” that can solve all agricultural extension challenges in developing countries. Nevertheless, in order to continue agricultural and rural development programs/projects that promote farmers’ self-reliance, it is essential to continue to extract the outcomes and impacts of the SHEP approach at the field level and disseminate the effectiveness of the approach widely. Key words: agricultural extension, market-oriented, SHEP approach, smallholder, JICA, technical cooperation, Kenya, income

Causal effect of severe and non-severe malaria on dyslipidemia in African Ancestry individuals: A Mendelian randomization study.

Dyslipidemia is becoming prevalent in Africa, where malaria is endemic. Observational studies have documented the long-term protective effect of malaria on dyslipidemia; however, these study designs are prone to confounding. Therefore, we used Mendelian randomization (MR, a method robust to confounders and reverse causation) to determine the causal effect of severe malaria (SM) and the recurrence of non-severe malaria (RNM) on lipid traits. We performed two-sample MR using genome wide association study (GWAS) summary statistics for recurrent non-severe malaria (RNM) from a Benin cohort (N=775) and severe malaria from the MalariaGEN dataset (N=17,000) and lipid traits from summary-level data of a meta-analyzed African lipid GWAS (MALG, N=24,215) from the African Partnership for Chronic Disease Research (APCDR) (N=13,612) and the Africa Wits-IN-DEPTH partnership for genomics studies (AWI-Gen) dataset (N=10,603). No evidence of significant causal association was obtained between RNM and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), total cholesterol and triglycerides. However, a notable association emerged between severe malarial anaemia (SMA) which is a subtype of severe malaria and reduced HDL-C levels, suggesting a potential subtype-specific effect. Nonetheless, we strongly believe that the small sample size likely affects our estimates, warranting cautious interpretation of these results. Our findings challenge the hypothesis of a broad causal relationship between malaria (both severe and recurrent non-severe forms) and dyslipidemia. The isolated association with SMA highlights an intriguing area for future research. However, we believe that conducting larger studies to investigate the connection between malaria and dyslipidemia in Africa will enhance our ability to better address the burden posed by both diseases.

The Wagner Group in Africa. The sham battle of Russian mercenaries against terrorism

In recent years, the Wagner Group has significantly increased its presence in several African countries. Russian mercenaries have become involved in many conflicts in an effort to expand their influence. One of their main tasks was to fight against terrorism. The analyses carried out, in which the author used qualitative methods and sources relating to the theoretical and practical dimensions of the issue at hand, indicate that the Wagnerists have been posing as their operations in order to maintain military presence on the African continent. Intensifying the Wagner Group’s presence is a long-term strategy of the Kremlin, which pursues interests along two tracks – benefiting from cooperation at the state level and engaging mercenaries. Countries of the wider West (members of the North Atlantic Alliance and the European Union) are also seeking to develop cooperation with African partners. Terrorist organisations also intend to fight for influence on the continent. In this regard, it is necessary to constantly monitor Russia’s proactive foreign policy aimed at the rivalry as it affects the presence of Poland and its allies in Africa.

Analyzing the Efficiency of Trade in Africa: A Stochastic Frontier Gravity Approach to Assess Intra-African Exports Performance and Potential

ABSTRACT The African integration projects established regional economic communities (RECs) to remove trade barriers and stimulate trade among the member countries. Our analysis aims to assess REC trading efficiency and explore trade potential. Assuming that any discrepancy between the observed trade level and the maximum predicted trade level is related to trade inefficiencies, the stochastic frontier gravity is estimated for a sample of 45 African exporting countries and their 43 African partners from 1996 to 2020. The results show low export efficiency among African countries, corresponding to sizable unexploited export capacities.

The racial biopolitics of humanitarianism in Africa: examining European resilience-building in the Sahel and lake Chad Basin

The racial biopolitics of humanitarianism in Africa: examining European resilience-building in the Sahel and lake Chad Basin

An Appraisal of the Challenges and Limitations of Developing African Countries in Negotiations with Multinational Entities and Developed Nations: Proposed Interventions

The paper takes a look at the limitations and challenges that negotiators of developing African countries encounter with multinational entities and developed nations. It identifies that negotiators of multinational and advanced economies appear to be very competitive and confrontational as against negotiators of developing African negotiators, who appear cooperative and collaborative, a soft-styled approach to negotiations, these disparities arise from power, network and resource imbalance. Some of the challenges encountered by African negotiators include aggressive demands, unilateralism and setting self-serving agendas, negative impact of demographic variables as well as intercultural challenges. Others include inadequate cultural intelligence, negotiating process fatigue, political interest and inadequate competent and experienced human resource and financial limitations among others. The Doha declaration points to the fact that weak nations such as African countries and partners, even though may appear as weaker actors can attain a successful negotiated outcome, when in strategic partnership and networks with identified mutual interest and benefits. The paper recommends the need for the establishment of a networked governance strategy, a more formidable one to the TRIPs network, which delivered a BATNA. Within the state and regional levels, African countries must consciously endeavor to provide their domestic institutions such as Foreign Ministries, Trade and Industry Ministries, national negotiation agencies, with the requisite capacities and expertise needed to be very effective and competitive. Good political well of governments is central in avoiding conflict of interest and corruption at the expense of the State for a BATNA. This would enable them to be better prepared with the requisite confidence, knowledge, and skills to negotiate for a better outcome with multinational corporations and nations.

Problems of legal regulation of bilateral investment agreements in the economic community of west african states (ECOWAS)

In the context of Russia’s implementation of a renewed foreign policy, in which new legal concepts like friendly and unfriendly states have emerged, special emphasis has been placed on the development of relations with African countries. Despite active attempts by Western countries to influence our country’s relations with African partners, most countries on the continent have not changed their attitude towards Russia and continue to show considerable interest in strengthening bilateral relations, including in the area of investment with Russia. The outcome of the 2019 Russia–Africa summit showed a high level of trust and expectations of African leaders from Russia. These circumstances should give a significant impetus to the active development by of the Russian Federation of equitable and effective trade relations with African countries, which is impossible without a detailed analysis of the legal framework of the ECOWAS states governing foreign investment.

Africa's Path to Sustainability: Harnessing Technology, Policy, and Collaboration

This paper explores the significant role of technological advancements, strategic policies, and collaborations in driving Africa towards a more sustainable future. It highlights how the continent's increasing adoption of innovative technologies, such as renewable energy solutions and digital infrastructure, coupled with well-crafted strategic policies and international collaborations, is transforming various sectors and fostering a sustainable future. These advancements have not only improved access to basic services like healthcare and education but have also created new opportunities for economic growth and job creation. The paper emphasizes the importance of ongoing collaborations between African countries and international partners in sharing knowledge, expertise, and resources to accelerate sustainable development efforts across the continent. The paper discusses different international organizations that have collaborated with and assisted Africa in the areas of technical innovation, finance, and knowledge exchange necessary to achieve a full-scale sustainable future. Despite their humanitarian efforts, Africa faces tremendous hurdles in attaining a sustainable future. These challenges range from a lack of access to technology and digital infrastructure in rural areas to difficulties in harnessing technological advancements due to infrastructure and connectivity constraints. These challenges have hindered Africa's ability to fully leverage the potential of technical innovation and digital solutions for a sustainable future. Limited financial resources and investment opportunities have further impeded progress in achieving the necessary infrastructure and connectivity upgrades. The continent is vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, which further hinders its development progress. Therefore, it is crucial for ongoing collaborations between African countries and international partners to address these challenges collectively and work towards long-term solutions for a sustainable future in Africa.