The AMBITION Project comes to an end: EU-Africa scientific cooperation for a sustainable transition
The European project AMBITION – AMBassadors for sustainable transITION, funded by the Erasmus+ Partnership for Cooperation programme, officially concluded after three years of activity (2022–2025) with a final event held at KNUST – Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana. Coordinated by Politecnico di Milano, the project involved European and African doctoral students and universities with the aim of strengthening scientific cooperation through doctoral training, considered a key driver for sustainable development and scientific diplomacy.
AMBITION has focused on doctoral training to generate impact on three levels:
• Institutional, strengthening the structures and governance of partner universities;
• Individual, providing doctoral students with interdisciplinary and transversal skills;
• Strategic, recognising doctoral studies as a tool for international cooperation and innovation.
Among the main activities carried out:
• Co-design of a Joint Honours Programme for EU-AU doctoral students, with shared regulations, supervision agreements, mobility, credit recognition and joint certification;
• Three Sustainable Innovation Schools (two in Nairobi, one in Delft), in person and accessible online;
• A web series on transversal skills, with 10 short courses on ethics, governance, gender equality and responsible engineering;
• The MOODLE platform “PhD AMBITION Gateway” with educational resources and project results;
• Development of a game-based teaching module for secondary school students, co-created by PhD students to teach sustainable development from African and European perspectives;
• Training on the science-policy interface and drafting of policy briefs by PhD students on key issues of sustainable transition in Ghana;
• Drafting of a White Paper with policy recommendations on the strategic value of doctoral studies in science diplomacy.
The project involved 35 doctoral students and numerous lecturers, creating a solid partnership between European and African universities. The partner universities are:
• Politecnico di Milano (Italy)
• Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden)
• ETH Zurich (Switzerland)
• RWTH Aachen University (Germany)
• TU Delft (Netherlands)
• Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology – KNUST (Ghana)
• Strathmore University (Kenya)
With the contribution of the della ONG Green Growth Africa Sustainability Network (Nigeria), whose CEO is Dr. Adedodyn Adeleke, a Polimi alumnus.
“AMBITION wanted to train a new generation of researchers capable of interpreting and promoting sustainability through science that is open to dialogue with institutions, society and local communities. Doctorates can and must become a strategic tool for scientific diplomacy.” declared Professor Emanuela Colombo, Delegate of the Rector of Politecnico di Milano for Scientific Diplomacy, full professor at the Department of Energy and project coordinator.
AMBITION represents the first joint project between Idea League and the African Union, bringing together five European universities of excellence, including Politecnico di Milano, and African universities in Kenya and Ghana.
The project successfully concluded a three-year journey that demonstrated the power of higher education as a bridge between continents, cultures and visions for a just and inclusive transition, leaving behind a replicable model of cooperation for future academic collaborations between Europe and Africa.
