APPEAR in practice
APPEAR in practice invites project partners to reflect and discuss their experiences referring to a specific topic in the project implementation process of their partnerships. Participation is a key concept in the development discourse. Actively involving stakeholders in all stages of the project cycle is seen as a prerequisite for successful and sustainable partnerships. How this concept is put into practice, who participates and to what extent, which participatory methods and instruments are used, what are the achievements and challenges will be discussed by Belay Hagos Hailu and Michael Hauser, two representatives of appear projects in Ethiopia.
Speakers
Belay Hagos Hailu has a PhD in Special Needs Education from Addis Ababa University (AAU). Since May 2012 he is the chair of the Department of Special Needs Education at the AAU. He is a team member of the appear project RESPOND-HER - Responding to Poverty and Disability through Higher Education and Research, an academic cooperation between the AAU and the University of Vienna. The project focuses on the educational and employment situation of people with disabilities, the most marginalized and disadvantaged groups within the Ethiopian society, facing a considerably higher risk of poverty. In particular their rights to education and employment are not sufficiently realized due to institutional barriers.
Michael Hauser has a doctoral degree in Agro-ecology from the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU). He is currently the Director of the Centre for Development Research at the BOKU. He has experience in the coordination and implementation of numerous development projects in Asia and Africa. Michael Hauser is the coordinator of the appear project TRANSACT- Strengthening Rural Transformation Competences of Higher Education and Research Institutions in the Amhara Region, Ethiopia. Such transformation competences demand institutional capacities that translate into new partnerships and learning alliances, allowing higher education and research to become more effective development partners and community service providers in the Amhara region. This project is a joint initiative of two Ethiopian universities, one agricultural research organization, one Austrian-funded rural development program and one Austrian university.
Chair: Stella Asiimwe, journalist
