ULiège and the Democratic Republic of Congo

The Université de Liège has been actively involved with Congolese academic institutions for almost seventy years. These relationships have made a significant contribution to the internationalization of the institution. ULiège is currently involved in approx. thirty research and teaching projects in the DRC.

 

History and background

The University of Liège has been active with Congolese academic institutions for almost seventy years, since the end of the Second World War, with the creation of the University of Lubumbashi. Central Africa has thus become the first pole of international collaboration outside Europe for our faculties. These relationships contributed significantly to the internationalization of the University.

In the 1970s, the University of Liège set up a Center for Development Cooperation (CECODEL) to coordinate the contributions of Liège professors to projects in the DRC. The Centre thus built the administrative instrument needed to implement Belgian university cooperation.

In 2012, CECODEL became PACODEL (Partenariat Coopération au Développement). This change emphasized the partnership dimension with the Congolese universities we work with today.

Key areas of collaboration

Today, our cooperation activities can be broken down into several main areas:

• Some Congolese universities benefit from institutional support thanks to Belgian federal funds: this is the case, for example, at the University of Lubumbashi and the University of Kinshasa, where ULiège professors teach courses, supervise doctoral theses and support institutional development.
• Thematic research projects place the expertise of ULiège professors and their Congolese partners at the service of Congolese issues: in the sharing of knowledge, the development of research and teaching skills or the valorization of results. These projects are supported by Belgian cooperation funds and private or public financing (World Bank, Unesco, FAO). Responding to needs clearly identified by the Congolese side, they are carried out jointly with ULiège centers of expertise, and generally involve the mobility of researchers in both directions. Over the past six years, 1,143 students from the DRC have been regularly enrolled at ULiège, making it the tenth most represented nationality among our students.
• The number of students from the University of Kinshasa and the concentration of both research and teaching projects in Kinshasa prompted the creation by ULiège in 2016 of ULiège's "Central Africa Platform" (Plateforme AC) located at ERAIFT (École Régionale Postuniversitaire d'Aménagement et de Gestion intégrés des Forêts et Territoires tropicaux), a UNESCO category 2 center located on the campus of the University of Kinshasa (UniKIN).

ULiège's Central Africa Platform

This Platform, which benefits from a permanent ULiège staff member, coordinates projects and the mobility of professors, helps supervise theses, provides training modules with ULiège professors and experts, disseminates information, identifies local demand and organizes scientific events.

• The Platform also contributes to training activities with players in Kinshasa, such as the ISC (Institut Supérieur de Commerce) and the BCDC (Banque Commerciale du Congo);
• The Platform reaches out to universities in Central Africa: in the DRC (Lubumbashi, Kisangani, Butembo, Bukavu, Goma, etc.) and in other countries in the region (Burundi, Rwanda, Cameroon and Chad, for example);
• Through a first unifying theme, that of peri-urbanization, the Platform proposes to respond to the region's societal challenges. This initial focus has evolved into other themes crucial to development, such as food security, health, governance, the environment and regional planning.

In 2018, 23 Congolese PhD students graduated; for the 2018-2019 academic year, there were over a hundred Congolese PhD students enrolled at ULiège and around 80 staff members active in the DRC.

ULiège's participation in numerous projects, as well as its Platform initiative, serve doctoral training and aim to respond to one of the DRC's major challenges: education through excellence.

These doctoral students, many of whom are enrolled in cotutelle programs with short periods of mobility, are the professors and managers of tomorrow, serving their country's influence. The Université de Liège is proud and happy to be able to contribute its expertise to the excellence program set up by the Democratic Republic of Congo.

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