News

Drawn from East and West Africa, 25 distinguished researchers will be convening a capacity development workshop in Evidence-Informed Decision-Making (EIDM). Intended to impart research communications and policy engagement skills in researchers, is a collaboration between the African Institute for Development Policy (AFIDEP) and the African Academy of Sciences (AAS). It is a five-day event running from 27-31 January, 2020 at Park Inn Hotel, Nairobi-Kenya.

The training targets early-to-mid-career researchers and aims at enhancing understanding of the value and strategies for EIDM. This will be through practical training particularly on effective communication of research findings to policy audiences. AFIDEP hopes to strengthen the participants’ commitment to contribute to efforts to institutionalise a culture of EIDM in their respective spaces. The ultimate goal is to increase the number of academic leaders championing EIDM in Africa.

The training curriculum will cover a variety of strategically selected focus topics including:

• The context of policy-making processes;
• Planning for evidence uptake, including conducting policy analysis, stakeholder analysis, and preparing research communication strategies;
• Packaging evidence for policy-makers, including simplifying evidence for general audiences, writing policy briefs, etc.;
• Monitoring, Learning and Evaluation (MLE) of research translation and policy engagement efforts

The training will be followed by 6 months mentor-ship to support application of knowledge and skills acquired. The workshop is a key activity of the Evidence Leaders in Africa Project which aims to expand leadership for the use of evidence in policy formulation and implementation by African governments.