2022 Africa Program

“In combating climate change, the Fellows in our Africa Program are taking on one of the defining challenges of our times.” EF Chairman, former U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.

PHILADELPHIA (PRWEB) November 10, 2021

Twenty-five dynamic doers from across Sub-Saharan Africa working to address the challenges of global warming have been selected for Eisenhower Fellowships’ innovative Africa Program that will bring them to the United States for five weeks of intensive meetings with experts in their fields in April, 2022.

The diverse group of 12 women and 13 men in the fields of agriculture, housing, public safety, water quality, finance, food security and environmental protection will meet with experts across the U.S. to exchange knowledge and refine their individual projects to produce concrete results when they return home, a hallmark of Eisenhower Fellowships (EF) programs.

These groundbreaking leaders will apply what they learn as they take on the various dimensions of climate change afflicting the world’s second most populous continent, wracked by the increasing frequency of floods, droughts, diminished crop yields and food shortages that have triggered starvation, cross-border migrations, interregional conflicts and political instability.

Their innovative EF projects include:

• The creation of a Renewable Energy Fund to support solar, biomass and waste-to-energy programs in Ghana.
• New land-use strategies and approaches to the management of small livestock in Kenya.
• A streamlined process for recycling plastic waste in Nigeria.
• Improvement in the efficiency of cooling equipment to reduce post-harvest food losses in Rwanda.
• The advancement of decarbonization of South Africa by manufacturing “green hydrogen” from desalinated water.
• New solar-powered cold storage facilities to reduce crop losses in Tanzania.
• The creation of a network of biogas plants and accompanying water wells to power small farms in Zimbabwe.

Selected from among hundreds of applicants, the 2022 Africa Fellows were chosen for their track records of effective leadership, their potential for greater influence in their professions and in their nations and their commitment to lifelong engagement with Eisenhower Fellowships’ global network of influential leaders.

The Africa Fellows will use their fellowships to combat the social inequities of climate change and advance EF’s historic mission of enhancing international understanding through direct dialogue to create a world more peaceful, prosperous and just. For details about these Fellows’ individual projects please see their biographies.

“Building bridges of trust among like-minded leaders in the United States and Africa has never been more vital and relevant,” said EF’s Chairman, former U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates. “In combating climate change, the Fellows in our Africa Program are taking on one of the defining challenges of our times.”

The 2022 Africa Program is EF’s second regional program on the sub-continent. In the fall of 2016, EF hosted its first regional program dedicated exclusively to Fellows from Sub-Saharan Africa. From a pool of 800 applicants, EF assembled a diverse group of two dozen visionaries who met with thought leaders in the U.S. and returned home to apply what they had learned to better their societies. A highlight of the program was a visit to the White House Rose Garden hosted by President Barack Obama.

Eisenhower Fellowships brings together innovative leaders from government, business, civil society, health care, technology, education, science, the arts and journalism, united by their commitment to advance EF’s mission of enhancing international understanding to create a world more peaceful, prosperous and just. Since its founding in 1953 as a birthday present to President Dwight Eisenhower his first year in the White House, more than 2,500 mid-career professionals from 115 countries have benefited from the unique, customized experience of an Eisenhower Fellowship.

For more information, please contact:

Erin Hillman
Vice President, Programs and Operations

Email: ehillman@efworld.org

Phone: 215-546-1738

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