By Jim Kaketch “What happens when policy makers, research community and governance institutions from across Africa come together to reflect and learn from each other? Powerful insights, deep connections and a renewed commitment to influencing policy, practice and decision making through co-creation of evidence in Africa” During the Utafiti Sera Inter-House Learning and Sharing convening...

By Mercy Limiri and Jim Kaketch Africa’s public policy making landscape is rapidly evolving to adapt to the multiple interests and intricate interconnection and geopolitics. An important aspect of this rapid change is the recognition of the interconnection between evidence generation and policymaking process. While evidence use has been widely endorsed, policymaking process is still...

As agricultural investments intensify to meet the food needs of a bulging global population, evidence points to the varying effects of conventional agriculture on environmental degradation, habitat fragmentation and biodiversity loss, with negative consequences for livelihoods and human-life quality. To address these challenges, there is an urgent call for countries across the globe to shift...

As agricultural investments intensify to meet the food needs of a bulging global population, evidence points to the varying effects of conventional agriculture on environmental degradation, habitat fragmentation and biodiversity loss, with negative consequences for livelihoods and human-life quality. To address these challenges, there is an urgent call for countries across the globe to shift...

By Jim Kaketch, Martin Atela and Tim Brewer  Background During the UN Water Conference 2023 (March 22-24, 2023), the UN headquarters in New York was abuzz with delegates from all over the world to mark the UN water week 2023. The event was a midterm review of the UN General Assembly’s Water Action Decade 2018 –...

Infrastructure development is a key driver for progress globally and yet it remains one of the most complex challenges of the 21st century in Africa. It is a critical enabler for productivity and sustainable economic growth and contributes significantly to human development, poverty reduction, and the attainment of the sustainable development goals (specific goals: Goal...

Rwanda’s Vision 2020, launched in the year 2000, focused on guiding the nation on what to do in order to survive and regain its dignity. On the other hand, the current Vision 2050, appears to be more targeted on Rwanda’s aspiration to transform its economy into a high-income country and modernize the lives of all...

Lack of meaningful engagements between researchers and policy practitioners have often stifled policy making efforts in Africa. As a consequence, research and policy making processes have always operated in silo formats, limiting cross learning and by extension effective policy making and programming. Across Africa, the need to integrate research evidence in the conversations and practices...

The methodological approach used to identify the suitable stakeholders for engagement in the Utafiti Sera house was round table discussions and a stakeholders’ mapping conducted by PAMOJA prior to the discussions. ‘Utafiti Sera’ a Swahili word for research policy is a combination of many things that ensure and enhance policy outcomes – a process, place,...

The First Utafiti Sera Stakeholders’ Forum on Urban Governance in Kigali was held on January 18, 2018 in Marasa Umubano Hotel, Kigali, Rwanda. The forum brought together 40 stakeholders from local, national and international institutions concerned with research, urban governance and transformation, and policymaking (see list of participants in Annex 2). The aim was to...