Cape Town hosted the WAITRO Summit 2022
The capital of South Africa was the stage of WAITRO’s flagship event
On the 14th and 15th of November 2022, research and innovation stakeholders from over 35 countries gathered in Cape Town, South Africa for the WAITRO Summit 2022. With the aim of building new partnerships and initiating working groups to face global challenges and contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), more than 140 delegates had the opportunity to learn and hear from renowned speakers, exchange experiences, network and collaborate during the two days of face-to-face event.
_
Day 1 – Keynotes, Roundtable and Capacity Development Workshops
The first day of the WAITRO Summit 2022 started with an opening ceremony, which featured a speech by the President of WAITRO HRH Princess Sumaya bint El Hassan. She highlighted how the urgency and utility of partnerships has become increasingly vital as challenges converge and correlates.
“We must remember that the core part of our mission is to ensure that no potential partner is left behind. We each have something to contribute.”
(HRH Princess Sumaya bint El Hassan, President of WAITRO)
Next, we had welcome speeches by Prof. Eugene Cloete, Dep. VC Research, Innovation and Postgraduate Studies at Stellenbosch University; and Prof. Nnenesi Kgabi, Director Research Support at North-West University. The opening ceremony also featured addresses from the Chief Director for University Planning & Institutional Planning, Feizal Toefy; and the Commissioner for Agriculture, Rural Development, Blue Economy, and Sustainable Environment (ARBE) of the African Union, H.E. Josefa Sacko. Sacko addressed the theme of the Contribution of Youths in Accelerating the Transformation Process of African Agriculture.
Dr. Raghunath Mashelkar, Former President of the Global Research Alliance and Former Director General of Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, closed the opening ceremony with a keynote on Innovation, Inclusion & Resilience – Cornerstones of Post-pandemic SDG 17. Among other valuable insights, Dr. Mashelkar shared key lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic, and how to find opportunity in adversity.
“Building resilient global partnerships is the need of the hour to solve global challenges.”
(Dr. Raghunath Mashelkar, Former President of the Global Research Alliance)
The highlight of the morning of the first day of the event was the Roundtable on SDG 17. Mamati Tembe, Head of Public Affairs Science and Sustainability at Bayer AG and Dr. Victor Konde, Scientific Affairs Officer at United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, opened the discussion with keynotes on Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership. For Dr. Konde, WAITRO can identify key issues that attract the interest of partners and member states and encourage its members to activate formal and informal partnerships along the innovation chain.
“Scientific partnerships are growing but innovation and entrepreneurial partnerships remain weak.”
(Dr. Victor Konde, Scientific Affairs Officer, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa)
_
After the keynotes, high-level guests addressed the question “How can WAITRO contribute to revitalizing the global partnership for sustainable development?”. The roundtable moderated by Dirk Saseta, Director General, Area of Promotion & Management at LEITAT, had as guests: David Tveit, EVP, Energy and Climate Division, DTI; Prof. Nnenesi Kgabi, Director Research Support, NWU; Dr. Paul Burrows, Vice President Overseas Cooperation, JITRI; Dr. Hussam Hussein, Executive Director Partnerships, RSS; and Jaime Arboleda Palacio, Deputy Director, CTA.
Also, in the morning we had The Network Pitch Workshop by the Pitch Coach and Innovation Advisor, Dirk Lehmann.
In the afternoon, delegates had the opportunity to participate in different capacity development workshops, and kick-off sessions – for the initiation of working groups focused on specific SDGs. Despite the diverse topics addressed in the workshops, such as R&D to Commercialization and 4.0 Industry, a common theme permeated the discussions: the importance of including communities in the search for solutions, listening to those who deal with the problem, and making them part of the problem-solving process.
_
The award ceremony of the German-African Innovation Incentive Award (GAIIA) by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) closed the first day of the summit.
Day 2 – Panel Discussion, Workshops and WAITRO SDG Impact Award
A panel discussion on Financing Innovative Solutions for the SDGs opened the second day of the WAITRO Summit. The discussion was introduced with a keynote by Keiron Brand, Bankable Nature Solutions Advisor at WWF-Netherlands, on Catalyzing Finance for Innovative Impact Solutions. In the context of Green Finance, he highlighted the importance of building partnerships with companies to ensure that they understand their pressures on nature and their nature-related risks, as well as to deploy resilience activities collaboratively.
“Encourage a meaningful shift in finance by integrating nature (and climate) into all financial decision making to support a shift in global financial flows away from climate and nature-negative outcomes and towards climate and nature-positive ones.”
(Keiron Brand, Bankable Nature Solutions Advisor at WWF-Netherlands)
_
After the keynote, renowned speakers discussed the theme Bridging the Gaps between the Private Sector and Innovative and High Impact Groups. Jean-Marc Champagne, Founder and Director of Seneca Impact Advisors, moderated the discussion with the panelists: Wesley Okeke, CEO at CUBIO Innovation Center; Laura Eck, Consultant at WWF; and Fungai Musana, Corporate Engagement Manager at WWF.
In parallel, the participants were able to benefit from the valuable learnings shared by Prof. Emad Ewais, Prof. Shimaa El-Haddad and Prof. Khaled Ibrahim during the workshop Enabling Small-scale Spare-parts Production in Developing Countries, organized by the WAITRO member Central Metallurgical Research and Development Institute (CMRDI).
Capacity development workshops and kick-off sessions for the SDG working groups complemented the summit’s program on this second day of the event. Attendees were able to learn more about the WAITRO Benchmarking Project with Knud Erik Hilding-Hamann, Senior Specialist at DTI, and Chuqiao Dong, Project Support at JITRI, and hone their skills in the second workshop offered by Dirk Lehmann, the Project Pitch, where he shared tips on how to create an impactful pitch, design powerful visuals, and perform a confident presence onstage.
The closing ceremony featured speeches by M.Sc. Nienke Buismann, Head of Unit for International Cooperation, European Commission; and Raymond Tavares, Representative in Cameroon & Central Africa at UNIDO. While Buisman addressed the topic The Africa Union-European Union Innovation Agenda as a contribution to reinforcing partnerships for sustainable development in Africa, Tavares focused on Digital Transformation and The Sustainability Imperative. According to him, WAITRO members must play a vital role in sustainable development, moving from their advisory roles to becoming development actors. For Tavares, WAITRO members must work side by side with Conformity Assessment Bodies to accelerate the use of new technologies, collaborating beyond national borders with the private sector and increasingly exploring nature-based solutions.
Next, participants and guests were able to hear from Yenny Meliana from BRIN, Julienne Nguefack from Université de Yaoundé, James Devitt from University of Huddersfield, and Marcelo Prim from SENAI about their successful collaboration stories initiated through the WAITRO’s Open Innovation Platform, SAIRA.
But the highlight of the summit’s closing ceremony was the WAITRO SDG Impact Award. Carolina María R. Ortiz (represented by Jaime Arboleda Palacio) from CTA, and Dr. Joshua O. Abuya from Kibabii University received a money prize in the amount of US$3,000 each from the WAITRO Secretariat in recognition of their projects and their impact on the Sustainable Development Goals.
_
The last day of the WAITRO Summit 2022 ended with a special dinner held at Lourensford Wine State, where delegates were able to celebrate not only the successful event, but above all, the fact that they were once again gathered together as partners, friends and members of the Global Innovation Family.
About the Author: WAITRO
