The First Interregional Dialogue on Education and Development in Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa held in 2023 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, facilitated the creation of a series of interregional graduate courses. Argentine professors devised and developed a series of 6 courses that were taught during the second quarter of the year at universities in different African countries. An initiative that demonstrates the success of the interregional dialogue strategy organized by OBREAL in collaboration with the Ministry of Education of the Argentine Republic and with the support of the African Union.

Interregional Dialogue Courses

The courses were designed based on the priorities established at the First Interregional Dialogue driven by OBREAL

The Interregional Dialogue promoted by OBREAL established a series of priority and common areas of action for the regions that participated in the event. These areas include food security and health, climate change and risk mitigation, and joint research and open access. Based on these priorities, professors from several Argentine universities developed 6 courses specifically designed to be taught in African universities.

The courses were held during the second quarter of 2024 and, according to the coordinators, were a resounding success. With more than thirty on-site students per course and twenty online students, the coordinators highlight the great added value of having graduates from different disciplines from different African countries together with Argentine professors in the same space.

The importance of south-south interregional cooperation

The coordinators of two of the courses, Luis Blacha, Clara Cerrotta and Fernando Alvira, explained in an interview with OBREAL the importance of addressing common problems between Africa and Argentina without the intermediation of a northern country.

As these two professors say, some African countries and some Latin American countries have many similarities. Therefore, some of the problems they face are shared. Addressing these issues jointly – as has been done in this case and as OBREAL does in its interregional courses – allows different approaches to be shared and shared solutions to be found.

These courses have been a first exercise in interregional cooperation and dialogue between the different southes, but all the coordinators agree that it should not be the last. There is a willingness to reissue – and even expand – these interregional courses. African students have shown interest in participating in new initiatives of this type… some, in fact, have expressed interest in traveling to Argentina to pursue their studies there.

Interregional Dialogue Courses

A success for OBREAL’s interregional dialogue strategy

OBREAL celebrates the success of these courses, which, as said before, arose from the Interregional Dialogue held in Buenos Aires in 2023. The courses are therefore tangible proof of the importance of holding interregional cooperation and dialogue events and demonstrate that there is interest and willingness to create links between different regions of the South.

We congratulate the promoters of the initiative and thank them for the words they dedicate to OBREAL, assuring that without the alliances woven by our association this initiative would not have been possible.

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