VaRRIWA - Sub-regional tour of the third-party project PPP-VRI to mobilise economic operators

The Public-Private Partnership for Research and Innovation Financing (PPP-VRI) project was on an advocacy and discussion mission in Benin, Burkina Faso and Senegal last week.

The objective is to set up a network of public-private partners based on dialogue and consultation, in order to better finance and valorize the results of research and innovation.
The results of R&I are often unknown to economic operators,” notes Professor Joseph Koffi Tsigbé of Togo, coordinator of the PPP-Vri project, “which leads to the use of imported solutions.
In these four countries, the research and innovation sector only benefits from 0.22% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDPà against an average of 0.4% for sub-Saharan Africa, far from the 1% average recommended by the African Union and the world average of 1.7%.
The project, operational in four West African countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Senegal and Togo) will organise a sub-regional innovation forum in September 2023 in Lomé (Togo), bringing together economic operators, employers, investors, academics and innovators, to accelerate the implementation of the public-private partnership framework.

PPP-VRI is one of the 14 third-party projects of VaRRIWA (Valorising research results and innovation in west Africa), one of the 12 initiatives supported by the ACP Innovation Fund, funded by the European Union.

VaRRIWA also plans to set up a platform for exchanges and a support fund for innovation in West Africa.

The press speaks about it:

VaRRIWA – Sub-regional tour of the third-party project PPP-VRI to mobilise economic operators