A Film about the Excellence Centers for Exchange and Development (Exceed)
Here is a short film by the Deutsche Welle Akademie, which presents the Exceed project and how it tackles wicked problems such as forced migration.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwJ5AdjdQAw
The program “Higher Education Excellence in Development Cooperation” (Exceed) is composed of five German higher education institutions – Technical University Braunschweig, University of Hohenheim, University of Kassel, TH Köln (University of Applied Sciences) and Ludwig-Maximilians-University München. Exceed was established by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) in 2009 and funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) since its inauguration. Since then, these centers in collaboration with their 37 partners in developing countries, have been establishing think tanks to contribute to the post-2015 development agenda.
The Exceed Conference on “Forced Migration – environmental and socioeconomic dimensions”
Migration is currently one of the main issues worldwide, however, the topic is not as new as often suggested by the public media. The reasons for migration or rather people are forced to escape from their living environment are manifold. They are not only fleeing from war, violence, suppression and persecution, but many thousands are leaving their homes because of hunger and poverty induced by a lack of economic opportunity, an ever-increasing degradation of their natural environment and the growing number of natural disasters.
As focal point of the Centers for Natural Resources and Development, the Institute for Technology and Resources Management in the Tropics and Subtropics (ITT), TH Köln together with four other universities organize the first exceed Conference on “Forced Migration – environmental and socioeconomic dimensions” from the 19th – 20th October 2016 in Berlin.
In 2009, five German higher education institutions – Technical University Braunschweig, University of Hohenheim, University of Kassel, TH Köln (University of Applied Sciences) and Ludwig-Maximilians-University München – were selected to be part of the Excellence for Development Cooperation (Exceed) Program by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Since then, these centers in collaboration with their 37 partners in developing countries, have been establishing think tanks to contribute to the post-2015 development agenda.
These five Exceed centers have now combined their forces to take a closer look at the environmental and socioeconomic dimensions of forced migration together with scientists, politician and the public from all around the world by organizing this first Exceed conference. During the course of the conference, current research results were presented, challenges were discussed and new strategies to prevent forced migration were identified in an interactive conference set-up.
After two days of intensive work, proposals and ideas for cooperation projects on the topics of development-induced displacement, water security, decent work, food & nutrition security and many more were developed. Particularly noteworthy are the many south-south cooperations that were formed. The focus of their work is on aspects of rural areas (agriculture, health), but also on the analysis of the effects of forced migration on the economies of different countries. More specifically, there will be workshops in 2017, research groups have been formed and networks were created. It is currently being considered to incorporate these diverse topics into the framework of a follow-up conference in 2017, thus providing the different working groups a platform to present their results of the project in 2017.
For further information please refer to the exceed website
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Call for Papers!
Are you looking where to publish your research about Natural Resources and Development? The Journal of Natural Resources and Development (JNRD) is calling for papers and looking for more reviewers!
For more information follow the link: http://eepurl.com/chVWmX
The 4th “Resource Efficient Cities” Workshop Series
Continuing the workshops’ series of the Curriculum Development of the Interdisciplinary Master Program “Resource Efficient Cities” (IMaREC) which started in Cairo, Egypt in June 2015, the 4th workshop took place in UASLP, San Luis Potosi – Mexico during the period 18th – 23rd July 2016. Four partner universities of the CNRD network in addition to UASLP participated in the workshop: TH Köln, Germany; ASU, Egypt; KU, Kenya; and UGM, Indonesia.
The workshop was twofold in that it included activities of both curriculum development and research. The curriculum development workshop aimed at defining course structures, learning units and full description of the four core courses comprising the first semester of IMaREC in terms of course aims/objectives, Intended learning outcomes (ILOs), course content, teaching method(s) and assessment method(s). The research workshop aimed at promoting the concept of resource efficient cities and prioritized relevant topics of the city as a socio-ecological and thus metabolistic system. This was done by developing a systematic urban case study approach for a scalable cities, including Cairo, Egypt (mega city), San Luis Potosi, Mexico and Yogyakarta, Indonesia (medium size cities), and Kisumu, Kenya (small size city) in order to pave the road to draft relevant and specified research proposals responding to calls of bilateral or multilateral funding options.
The workshop was enriched by two open sessions with inputs from international guests of topics related to resource efficient cities such as “Urban metabolism and system theory”, “Water efficient urban systems”, and “Introducing urban sustainable model: La Pila”. Professors and students from the different faculties of UASLP joined the opening sessions and participated actively in the discussions. Furthermore, the workshop included a very interesting field trip to explore urban strategies for food production and water management in a local elementary school as a sustainable model developed by UASLP, where sustainable practices of rainwater harvesting, urban farming, greenhouse, fruit trees farm, waste water treatment, soccer field design and photovoltaic design have been implemented. The field trip also included visits to local brick makers and to a social housing development “Villa Esperanza” for exploring environmental-social design aspects and community governance.
Moreover, the workshop hosted an important event for strengthen international cooperation; based on the CNRD agreement, a bilateral agreement between ASU, Egypt and UASLP, Mexico was launched with the presence of the Egyptian Consulate of the Egyptian Embassy in Mexico and the Rector of UASLP.
Urban Gardening in Cairo, Egypt
Group picture of the workshop participants