Programmes

The North-South Centre manages a series of programmes by which individual projects of its members are co-funded or supported otherwise. Some of these programmes have been ongoing for many years, while others are more recent initiatives.

Dating back to 1994, the SDC co-funded contract on international agriculture is the most long-standing programme. Since 2002, it has been focused on “Livestock systems research in support of poor people”. In 2010, most of the projects in this programme were concluded or in their final stage. SDC granted a contract extension for a number of post-doctoral projects. These projects were not restricted to livestock systems but could cover any topic in the two research areas of “Food security” and “Natural resource management“.

Investing in the capacity development of young scientists is one of the most promising tasks of any university. The North-South Centre contributes to this task with a couple of externally funded fellowship programmes. The Research Fellow Partnership Programme for Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources (RFPP) is funded by SDC. It covers doctoral and post-doctoral projects on “Food security” and “Natural resource management“.

Since 2009, the “Sawiris Scholarships – Science & Technology for the South” complement the RFPP. Donated by the Sawiris Foundation for Social Development, these scholarships are open to doctoral candidates of all disciplines at the ETH Zurich. The goal of the programme is to promote the development of products or methods which are directly relevant for improving the livelihoods of poor people in developing countries.

The North-South Centre is responsible for a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the ETH Zurich. The interdisciplinary research project “myEcosystem” was implemented under this MoU and started in 2009. It comprises three interlinked doctoral theses and a post-doctoral project on assessing and compensating ecosystem impacts of agricultural products.

Finally, the ETH Zurich enables the North-South Centre to provide its members with small grants as seed money for new partnerships. In addition, it supports short-term activities such as visiting scientists from developing countries or teaching stays at universities in developing countries.