Master's in Protected Areas Management & Biosphere Reserves Management and in Forest Management Techniques

INTERNATIONAL CALL FOR APPLICATIONS

Organization of a Professional Regional Master's Degree in Protected Area Management & Biosphere Reserve Management (GAP/GRB) and Forest Management Techniques (TAF) (Sixth Cohort)

Brief Presentation of ERAIFT

This Regional School was established on April 10, 1999, around UNESCO's MAB (Man and the Biosphere) program, which aims for sustainable human development in harmony with the environment. Initially conceived as a UNESCO project, the School has seen its institutional consolidation in recent years, now enjoying the status of a Category 2 Center under the auspices of UNESCO, with its own international governance bodies. Since its inception, it has contributed to capacity building among professionals and decision-makers from 22 Francophone and Lusophone countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian Ocean region, focusing on protected area management as well as sustainable management of tropical forests and territories. ERAIFT's headquarters are in Kisangani, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), but it currently operates on the campus of the University of Kinshasa (UNIKIN) in Kinshasa, DRC, and is established in the two biosphere reserves in the DRC: the Yangambi and Luki Biosphere Reserves. ERAIFT's mission is to train specialists capable of designing, formulating, and implementing sustainable development projects and making decisions in the complex situations that characterize development issues, determined to provide solutions to problems associated with poverty and environmental degradation. Its primary goal is to contribute to increasing the national capacities of African states in implementing a new methodological approach that addresses the issues of managing and developing tropical ecosystems from a systemic perspective, in consultation with rural populations.

Organization of Accredited Regional Master's Programs

Programs Offered and Involved Institutions

In the context of South-South cooperation, ERAIFT has signed a memorandum of understanding with the following sub-regional institutions for the implementation of a Regional Master's Program aligned with the LMD (Bachelor-Master-Doctorate) system. The institutions involved in the memorandum are as follows: Universities of Dschang and Yaoundé I, the Garoua Wildlife School (EFG/Cameroon), the National School of Water and Forests (ENEF/Libreville), the University of Science and Technology of Masuku (USTM/Gabon), and the University of Kisangani (UNIKIS/DRC). As part of its "French-English bilingualism" promotion program, other cooperation agreements have been concluded with institutions in the Anglophone world, notably the Southern African Wildlife College (SAWC) in South Africa.

Regarding North-South cooperation, this program is implemented by the 35 member institutions of AGRINATURA and ERAIFT. The official language of instruction is French; however, English is frequently used by teachers, guest lecturers, and assistants, as one of the School's challenges remains the development of bilingualism (French-English) within its teaching and scientific research activities. This call for expressions of interest aims to select a maximum of 40 candidates for professional master's degree programs in two different fields:

• Protected Area Management and Biosphere Reserve Management (GAP/GRB)
• Forest Management Techniques (TAF)