INSPIRE-UAC- Project An academia partnership for public health

Benin, supported by the Regional Office of the World Health Organization, has the ambition of  becoming a strategic centre of excellence in training, research and expertise to tackle the great social and health-related challenges in Africa.
The Université d’Abomey-Calavi currently has a public health training offer, at the Bachelor’s/Licence and Master’s level. However, this offer needs to be restructured to better meet the changing needs of the health sectors and the economy linked to the epidemiological transition, newly emerging diseases and the public health crises that Benin and the West and Central African sub-regions have experienced in recent decades. 
Training for field staff (Bachelor’s/Licence degree) and executives (Master’s degree) is fundamental for the design, implementation and management of monitoring, screening and preventive / healthcare promotion programmes, and clinical and epidemiological research programmes (PhD/Doctorate degree).

The INSPIRE-UAC project aims to structure a long-term academic partnership to implement higher education training programmes delivered by the Université d’Abomey-Calavi in Benin: a quality, job-oriented Bachelor’s/Licence, Master’s and PhD/doctorate programme, attractive at national, regional and international level. The ambition? Respond to current and emerging needs of academic and socioeconomic actors in the human and animal health and environmental sectors in Benin. 

The project was selected for the second edition of the “Academia Partnerships Africa-France” programme (PeA). It is financed by the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs via the Agence française de développement (AFD). The PeA programme is implemented by the Agence nationale de la recherche (ANR – French National Research Agency) and Campus France with support from the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research
 

This project contributes to achieving the following  Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs):    

• Ensure access to the means for living a healthy life and promote well-being at all ages (SDG 3).
• Co-build quality, job-oriented training programmes on the African continent (SDG 4).