The Africa Program of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has organized a forum on "Science in Mozambique: Exploring Opportunities for Collaboration," to be held during the AAAS Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C., in February 2000. Support is being provided for six Mozambican researchers to participate in this forum, as well as in the rest of the Annual Meeting. They will give presentations on the state of Mozambican science in such diverse fields as agronomy, forestry, marine biology, archeology, anthropology, physics, and botany, to be followed by an interactive discussion with audience members on collaborative research opportunities. Additionally, one Mozambican delegate will give a presentation at the Symposium on Ethnobotany/Bioprospecting, and another delegate will participate in the Roundtable on Large Marine Ecosystems in Africa. The target audience will include researchers, US policymakers, and representatives of donor funding agencies. The Mozambican participants are: Dr. Lidia Brito, Vice Rector for Academic Affairs at the University of Eduardo Mondlane (UEM); Dr. Antonio Hoguane, Coordinator of the Chair of Marine Sciences and Oceanography, UEM; Mr. Salomao Bandeira, Head of the Botany Section in the Department of Biological Sciences, UEM; Ms. Zelia Menete, Faculty of Agronomy and Forest Engineering, UEM; Dr. Paula Meneses, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, UEM; and Mr. Augusto Cabral, Director of the Museum of Natural History.
The Mozambican delegation will also give a similar presentation at the Africa-America Institute's National Summit on Africa, which is also meeting in Washington, D.C., at the same time. Additionally, the Mozambican researchers will independently meet with US researchers and government officials, and donor organization representatives or other relevant individuals, to explore specific collaborative opportunities in their fields of expertise.
Mozambique's recovery from a prolonged period of armed conflict (which ended in 1992) is enabling its researchers to explore opportunities for intellectual exchange and scientific collaboration with other nations. A large country (approximately 498,000 square miles), it contains varied geographical regions, experiences many different climatic conditions, and has a rich diversity of plant and animal species and ecosystems, many of which have not been studied by US researchers. UEM has an excellent scientific faculty and some of the finest research facilities in Subsaharan Africa, and is Mozambique's premier research institution. The recently rehabilitated and reopened Museum of Natural History has research collections that include specimens of more than one million insects, as well as specimens for 400 bird species. These collections can provide researchers with important historical information on the biodiversity of many of Mozambique's insect and animal populations. This visit will enable the Mozambican researchers to interact with a wide audience of US researchers and professionals for the purposes of drawing attention to the research opportunities that are available in Mozambique, and stimulating interest in the development of collaborative projects.
