International cooperation between France and South Africa: ARC, CIRAD and INRAE sign a tripartite agreement

Institutional news 27 July 2020
On Friday 24 July 2020, Dr Shadrack Ralekeno Moephuli, CEO of the ARC (Agricultural Research Council), Michel Eddi, President Managing Director of CIRAD and Philippe Mauguin, Chair and CEO of INRAE signed a 5-year unprecedented tripartite agreement to strengthen and extend existing collaborations between the three organizations. The institutions confirmed their intentions of working together to tackle the challenges facing the southern Africa region and of contributing to the dialogue on global initiatives that is unfolding in the area. The agreement was initialled remotely by video conference, with Aurélien Lechevallier, Ambassador of France to South Africa, as a witness.
CIRAD President Managing Director Michel Eddi, PDG du Cirad (left) and INRAE Chair and CEO Philippe Mauguin (right) sign the tripartite agreement with Shadrack Ralekeno Moephuli, CEO of the South African Agricultural Research Council © F. Feron, INRAE

CIRAD President Managing Director Michel Eddi (left) and INRAE Chair and CEO Philippe Mauguin (right) sign the tripartite agreement with Shadrack Ralekeno Moephuli, CEO of the South African Agricultural Research Council © F. Feron, INRAE

The agreement seeks to reinforce, and expand, existing collaborations between the two French research institutes and South Africa's leading research and development organization in agriculture and related fields. This is the first cooperation agreement signed jointly by CIRAD and INRAE with an African research institution. The agreement will facilitate staff exchanges, joint organization of scientific events, and project development on a wide range of scientific topics, extended to new areas such as family farming, climate change adaptation, and the impact of science.

This new agreement follows two previous ones signed between ARC and CIRAD, in 1999, and between ARC and INRA, now INRAE, in 2014. In the short term, collaborations already exist in the fields of animal health (notably African swine fever), bovine genomic selection, plant protection, and climate change, as well as for the promotion of dialogue and the dissemination of knowledge in the whole African continent.

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