The?inaugural cohort?of the?One Planet Fellowship?Laureate Candidates has been selected! Among?1, 523 applicants?from six anglophone and six francophone African countries who responded to?the call for the inaugural applications?early this year, 45 of Africa’s outstanding young, high-potential scientists have been selected to take part in the Fellowship. The Laureate Candidates hail from Benin, Burkina Faso, Tanzania, Togo, Zambia, Nigeria, Mali, Malawi, Senegal, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Côte d’Ivoire.

The official launch of the cohort will take place on September 16, 2019, at the Safari Park Hotel in Nairobi, Kenya. The launch will also mark the commencement of the Fellowship activities with a week-long Fellowship and Mentoring Orientation Workshop for the 45 Laureate Candidates and an additional group of 45 seasoned researchers on the African continent who will serve as Mentors to the Candidates.

The One Planet Laureate Candidates are focusing on a wide range of agricultural research topics including climate-smart agricultural innovations, greenhouse gas emissions from smallholder farming systems, trends in climate variability and change among others. Some of the Laureate Candidates are also contributing authors to the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.

Keep it here for in-depth profiles of the?Candidates who will go through a three-year career acceleration process to enhance their leadership and scientific capacities to help African smallholder farmers cope with the changing climate.

Announced at?the One Planet Summit?in 2017, the One Planet Fellowship is a career development initiative that is building a robust pipeline of scientists leading climate change research in Africa. The Fellowship is designed to build and enhance the mentoring, scientific, networking, and leadership skills of high-potential researchers working on the nexus between agriculture and climate change adaptation and mitigation.