The Capacity Building Department of the West African
Science Service Centre on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use, WASCAL,
has organised a five-day intensive workshop on climate change impact,
mitigation and adaptation for fifteen scientists drawn from the
ministries and government departments of environment, agriculture, water
resources, meteorology, space and environmental protection agencies
from Ghana, Benin, Togo and Nigeria.
The workshop which was
organized at the headquarters of WASCAL in Accra is the first in the
series of workshops lined-up by WASCAL under the sponsorship of the
Federal Ministry of Education and Research, Germany (BMBF).
The
workshop was part of WASCAL’s strategic vision to extend its capacity
building beyond its graduate studies programmes run in partnership with
ten lead universities in West Africa.
In an interview with
Professor Janet Adelegan, WASCAL’s Director of Capacity Building
Programme and workshop coordinator at WASCAL, she highlighted the key
objectives of the workshop;
“The essence of this workshop was to
educate West African managers and scientists in relevant government
agencies on the implications of climate change variability on
livelihood, adaptation and mitigation strategies in West Africa”
“Also,
the workshop was designed to promote linkage between research and
practice, create an environment for the exchange of experience, identify
research priorities, and highlight capacity building needs for policy
research in Climate Science in West Africa”. She expounded.
WASCAL
seeks to strengthen the existing human capacity of member countries to
allow them participate in the on-going global discourse on climate
change and respond to current and future adaptation and mitigation
challenges. Its training programmes are intended to build the capacity
of mid-level scientists and policy analysts, and produce first class
students interested in careers in academia.
