The Sixth African Higher Education Week and RUFORUM Biennial Conference which was held as from 22-26th October 2018 attracted a total of 1107 participants, inclusive of 105 Vice-Chancellors, 110 Principals and Deans and more than 530 students. A Total of 20 preconference and side events were held, with 12 plenary sessions and 18 scientific technical parallel sessions were also conducted.
The Vice-Chancellor Prof. Teresa Akenga, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Prof. Phillip Raburu and students from the School of Agriculture and Biotechnology represented the University fully during the five days event.
The event whose theme was ‘Aligning African Universities to Accelerate Attainment of Africa’s Agenda 2063’ had an overall objective of providing a platform for dialogue on the role of agricultural universities in Africa’s development agenda to contribute to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030.
The Forum was ideal, as it enhanced deliberation on key issues, and the African Universities Vice-Chancellor resolved to:
- Enhance sharing of knowledge, lessons and experiences with international and regional partners to accelerate transformation of African Universities.
- Enhance focus on strengthening agribusiness innovation in Africa by tapping on the entrepreneurial spirits of graduates to contribute to self-employment and creation of new employment opportunities.
- Utilize the academic mobility within these universities to accelerate training and development.
- To strengthen the use of ICTs to improve on the teaching and learning activities.
- Provide programs that will enhance gender balance through facilitating mentoring of Women scientists in Africa.
- Build capacity to drive Agri-food systems transformation in Africa.
- Improve on post graduate completion rates with emphasis being placed on women scientist through appropriate funding for research and structured supervision and finally,
- Strengthen Research capacity and excellence in African Universities.
The conference further reiterated its commitment to enhance networking and partnering in championing of higher education, agricultural innovations, food and nutrition security among African Universities.