JICA signed Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) with Nagaoka University of Technology, for Education and Research on Social Innovation in Africa

On February 9, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) signed a "Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) for Education and Research on Social Innovation in Africa" with Nagaoka University of Technology (NUT).

The signing ceremony was held at NUT in Nagaoka City, Niigata Prefecture, and the MoC was signed by the President of Nagaoka University of Technology, Dr. Kamado Shigeharu, and Director General of Africa Department of JICA, Mr. Yanase Naoki, witnessed by the Vice President of Nagaoka University of Technology, Dr. Takahashi Osamu, as well as Special Assistant to the President of JICA, Dr. Togawa Masato.

Based on this MoC, JICA and NUT will work together to develop human resources for international cooperation that will contribute to tackle development issues in Africa, encouraging the students of NUT and Japanese technical college (Kosen) students to seek and apply countermeasures for the development issues in Africa. Those countermeasures are also expected to serve as the countermeasures for domestic issues in Japanese regional areas.

In an exchange of opinions prior to the signing of the MoC, President Kamado explained that NUT places importance on social implementation and has been working on various regional issues in Japan, in collaboration with private companies and local governments, and that he hopes to combine JICA's knowledge of the African region and NUT's social implementation capabilities through this MoC. Dr. Togawa, Special Assistant to the President of JICA, and Mr. Yanase, Director General of the Africa Department of JICA, emphasized the importance of tackling development issues in Africa, which is expected to account for 25% of the world's population by 2050, and their expectations for NUT's social implementation research capabilities to address these issues.

NUT has cooperated with JICA in the implementation of an ideathon, "JICA - Kosen (Technical College) Open Innovation Challenge" for technical college students to tackle development issues in Africa, which JICA has been supporting since 2019. A total of 207 students from 14 technical colleges across Japan have participated in the ideathon so far.

As examples from the "JICA – Kosen Open Innovation Challenge," a team from Kitakyushu National College of Technology conducted a demonstration experiment of a device which automatically measure the sugar content of coffee beans in Rwanda. Also, a team from Nagaoka National College of Technology developed a device to use Black Soldier Fly larvae as a fertilizer and animal feed in Kenya. Of these, the device using Black Soldier Fly larvae is adopted in Japan for local waste treatment.

Based on this background, JICA and NUT have agreed to collaborate in educating Kosen (technical college) students and NUT students in order for developing human resources for international cooperation to encourage innovative ideas that will contribute to solving social and development issues both in Africa and Japanese reginal areas.