The UDS Model of University - Community Partnership for Sustainable and Inclusive Development

Event details

Room - CL/A/027, Church Lane Building, Heslington, York YO10 5ZF

ABSTRACT

The University for Development Studies (UDS) was established in 1992 as the premier university in northern Ghana. The UDS was established with the specific mandate to “blend the academic world with that of the community in order to provide constructive interaction between the two for the total development of Northern Ghana, in particular, and the country as a whole”. To achieve this mandate, the University has over the years used partnerships with rural communities in its catchment area to bring about transformative, inclusive and sustainable development. The University uses its Third Trimester Field Practical Programme to deploy students as change agents and impact makers to rural communities for field practical training. The University has worked with the government of Ghana and Development Partners such as the UK government through Innovate UK/KTP to provide sustainable solutions to our developmental problems and these include the recent fortified blended flour (C-Real) to fight malnutrition in school children. The University has in the past worked with UNIDO to fabricate an environmentally friendly shea nut roaster to reduce the health hazards that rural women have to contend with in their shea butter processing activities. There have been many other innovations by the University that are impacting lives. Thus, the UDS model of University - Community Partnerships for inclusive and sustainable development is therefore a success story that should be replicated, especially across Africa where academic institutions continue to exist largely as islands of knowledge with little impact on practice. The University is interested in strengthening and sustaining its partnership with the University of York on a win-win terms and will in this presentation be sharing specific areas of interests for future collaborations and partnerships.