From 24 to 26 July 2017, the final conference of the Network of Energy Excellence for Development, the NEED project, took place at the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST) in Windhoek, Namibia.
Over the past 3 ½ years, five universities from Botswana, Germany, Namibia and Zambia joined forces to create structures for the development of technical know-how, to interlink relevant stakeholders and to foster awareness and the willingness to take sustainable action for development of Renewable Energy Technologies (RET) in target countries.
The meeting started off with a high-level reception and dinner at the NUST Hotel School on Monday, 24 July.
As host of the conference, NUST Vice-Chancellor Prof Tjama Tjivikua welcomed 20 invited guests, including diplomats and representatives from the local renewable energy sector on behalf of the NEED project team. H.E. Hon Obeth Kandjoze, Minister of Energy and Mines, provided the keynote speech.
With this closing event, the NEED team once again brought together key players of the renewable energy sector in Namibia and other partner countries in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region, further promoting the use of, and the cooperation in, the area of RET. Moreover, the conference served as the perfect opportunity to officially announce and celebrate the formal registration and institutionalisation of the NEED network, which was the project’s major goal.
“It is a great pleasure for us to launch our long-term network, NEED, today with so many of our key stakeholders from 3 ½ years of the NEED project present. Despite the nostalgic feeling when closing the project period, we very much look forward to continuing our work in the RET sector in the region, not only as project team, but especially together with our long-standing and potential new partners”, said NEED project leader Prof Wilfried Zoerner from Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt (THI).
The actual conference was held at the NUST Auditorium and jointly opened by H.E. Jana Hybaskova, EU Ambassador and Head of Delegation, and Prof Tjama Tjivikua. In addition to the presentations of the project’s activities and main achievements by all NEED partners, the programme included inter alia an exhibition by partners engaged in the area of renewable energy in southern Africa.
Furthermore, in a panel discussion with NEED stakeholders such as the SADC Centre for Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency, TESLA Energy Solutions and ALENSY, past and potential future cooperation with the NEED network was discussed. To widen the audience’s perspective on activities being conducted by other actors in the sector, Dr Eilu from Makerere University, Uganda, and Dr Rapitsenyane from the University of Botswana participated in the programme giving presentations of their content-wise comparable EU-funded projects. Dr Eilu provided an insight in the achievements of the “ENRICH” and “SUCCEED” projects, Dr Rapitsenyane presented the outcomes of the “LeNSes” project, all of which ended in early 2017.
The NEED project itself is funded by the European Union through its Africa, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States’ Science and Technology (S&T II) programme.
With more than 60 participants, the final conference of the NEED project was considered a great success. For more information on past and future activities, please visit www.need-project.org; for any other queries, please contact info@need-project.org.
Source: NEED Project
