The Africa Study Group Presents:”Canadian Business in Africa” and “The Nollywood Phenomenon: open innovation and creative entrepreneurship”
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DATE: Wednesday, April 26, 2017 TIME: 17:30 pm – 19:30 pm LOCATION: St. Paul’s university, Guigues Hall, 223 Main street, room G102 Bios: Paul Hitschfeld was ASG Chair from 2009 to 2012. He has worked in international development for over 40 years, with NGOs, CIDA and as a university lecturer. His main interest is in the post-independence experience of African countries. He will provide a short report on the recent Canadian Council on Africa Roundtable on Increasing Canadian Business Presence in Africa, with his conclusions that efforts to do so will need to be quite narrowly targeted. Chidi Oguamanan is a law professor at the University of Ottawa, ad vi sor to the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) and a founder of ABS Canada and OpenAIR (African Innovation Research) See www.openair.org.za/people/ |
Boko Haram in Niger: Humanitarian Response in a Volatile Context and the Effects of New Insurgent Groups
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Event Date: April 20, 2017 – 11:30am to 1:00pm With an estimated 340,000 refugees, returnees, and internally displaced people in the Diffa region (local population 600,000) in southeast Niger, escalating insecurity and violence in nearby northern Nigeria has sparked a humanitarian crisis. Over 180,000 people fled across this porous border between late 2013 and late 2015. In Niger itself, Boko Haram attacks since early 2015 and forced government relocations have resulted in internal displacement. The influx of refugees from Nigeria and returnees to Niger has stretched already scarce resources in a region of chronic food insecurity, poor access to basic services, and recurrent droughts and floods. Displaced people are spread across remote host communities, with only about 4% of them residing in camps. Humanitarian actors struggle to reach them due to limited infrastructure, a volatile security situation, and fluid population movements across this large geographic area. How has the humanitarian community faced these challenges? In 2013, no organizations were dealing with these problems; today there are over 60 of them. As the first humanitarian organization to respond, what was the role of the IRC and how did it contribute to new actors becoming involved? How has this transition taken place? What lessons can we take from Adaptive Management strategies? Matias Meier is the Country Director for the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in Niger. Chris Huggins, Assistant Professor at the University of Ottawa’s School of International Development and Global Studies, will chair the event. Free. In English and French. Registration is not required but please come early as seating is limited. |
Job Opportunity: Progam Assistant – Collaborative Research
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Location: Ottawa CCIC and CASID are undertaking a three-year research program entitled Next-Generation Leadership: New Models for Canadian Collaboration in International Development. The program aspires to generate a more collaborative, relevant and timely, and effective and impactful ecosystem of knowledge and learning in Canada by fostering new ways of working among practitioners, researchers, academics, students and policy developers. To achieve this goal, the program will support partnerships between academia and practitioners through different models of collaboration – for example, joint research initiatives, communities of practice, secondments, regional events, and conferences – that generate timely and policy-relevant knowledge. |
POST-DOCTORAL STUDY ON ENVIRONMENTAL ANTHROPOLOGY
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PERIOD: MARCH 2017- NOVEMBER 2017 MOZALINK is a multi-disciplinary study project that is conducted through an international collaboration of academic and research institutions, namely, IRD (REUNION ISLAND), CORDIO (KENYA), Eduardo Mondlane University, (MOZAMBIQUE), IHSM (MADAGASCAR), Ulanga Ngazidja (COMORES), University of Dar es Salaam (TANZANIA), UNESCO/Marine World Heritage (INTERNATIONAL). The study addresses regional and local scale issues related to marine ecology, social perception and spatial planning in the Mozambique Channel. A set of local sites has been selected for focused local studies and ‘control’ sites to these, presence of appropriate-sized villages (500-3,000 inhabitants), presence/absence of migrants, national prioritizations, and presence of local partners to facilitate in fieldwork and achieving impacts as a result of the project. |
Call for Papers Linking borderlands research and policy in Africa and Europe: Tackling translation challenges
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In early 2016, two contrasting developments made visible long-term trends in how Europe and Africa interpret their borders. In Europe, where political rhetoric had quickly focused on a ‘refugee crisis’ with radical proposals to secure Europe’s borders, the notion of a police-able border, possibly one located outside Europe, was quickly growing in prominence. The EU was moving towards a more centralised version of border management; at the 2016 GLOBSEC meeting in Bratislava in April, the focus lay on the creation of a European security strategy. This securitisation discourse has important repercussions for African countries, particularly in the Sahel region, where the combination of increasing terrorism threats and efforts to externalise the EU’s borders intertwine and where the securitization agenda frequently plays out against the background of a dilution of statehood. The call for papers closes on April 24, 2017. |
