African Research Network for Urbanization and Habitable Cities

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The project, titled 'African Research Network for Urbanization and Habitable Cities' aims at providing a strategic platform for developing research capacities in African Institutions to address the Sustainable Development Goals. Using a hub and spoke model that will see increased collaboration amongst African teams from diverse disciplines, the Network aligns closely with the focus of the ARUA-UKRI GRCF Partnership Programme for creating and strengthening African-African teams and networks. As the host of the ARUA Centre of Excellence on urbanization and habitable cities, the University of Lagos is the Network hub, providing administrative and research leadership. The pioneer spoke universities are: Federal University of Technology, Minna, Obafemi Awolowo University both in Nigeria; University of Ghana, University of Cape Town, South Africa; American International University (West African Campus), The Gambia; Sierra Leone Urban Research Centre of the Njala University, Sierra Leone, University of Zambia and Uganda Martyrs University, Uganda. This reflects partnership between Sub-Saharan African countries, ranking predominantly as Least Developed and Lower Middle Income Countries on the DAC-list. Another common feature among these countries is the negative impact of rapid urbanization on city forms, limiting productivity of residents and city competitiveness. This is the development challenge that the Network seeks to impact. Taking advantage of the existing work of its host Centre of Excellence which has eight multidisciplinary research clusters that uses knowledge co-production frameworks in research, advocacy and capacity building programmes, the Network will work within several disciplines required to create sustainable cities, bringing in policy makers, city authorities, businesses, civil society and community residents for impact. In addition, the Network will draw on existing relationships with academic researchers, research groups and organizations in UK institutions who have committed to supporting it. Interactions between the Africa-UK partners will create long term linkages that will lead to expanded knowledge, policy action and transfer for improving productivity, city competitiveness and economic prosperity, and therefore, national economy. The development of newer and stronger partnerships that will endure beyond this grant period is a core impact factor for the Network. Network activities include themed capacity building workshops to build skills in research, community engagement, policy engaged and business case development, research management, ethics and grant writing amongst others. Some of these will be offered on-line. Other activities are: masterclasses in specific knowledge areas, mandatory PhD colloquial in annual conferences, researcher exchange programs within the hub, spoke and UK universities to ensure mentoring and scoping studies to enable researchers (especially post-graduate and early careers) take part in research activities. Research and knowledge outcomes arising from this activity will be disseminated through development of tool-kits, policy guide-lines and policy briefs, working papers, journal articles, conference proceedings, information pieces, blogs, monographs, book of readings, book of chapters and most importantly, short messages on social media outlets. Local language dissemination, stakeholder co-production and engagement workshops would be strongly prioritized for activities impacting local communities.The activities of the Network will be led by the Principal Investigator/Centre Director, Professor T.G Nubi, a seasoned practicing academia who has a strong track record in research, mentoring, private-sector, policy and community engagement. His team will report to an Advisory Board that will oversee the activities of the network and review progress. Network Activities will be spread over 36 months with commencement in September 2019