Editorial
16 Jun 2011
In this issue of our quarterly e-Newsletter we give you an overview of the latest developments and updates on the NFP, NPT and NICHE programmes.
Welcome
First of all, I am pleased to welcome Ms Ute Jansen as our new Head of Capacity Building Programmes. Before joining Nuffic, Ute worked as Regional Manager East and Central Africa at Oxfam Novib in The Hague.
NFP and NICHE in 2012
On 18 March 2011 Ben Knapen, Minister for European Affairs and International Cooperation, sent the House of Representatives a 'Focus letter' which outlines his plans for the coming years. The letter, which unfortunately is only available in Dutch, announces a drastic reduction in the number of developing countries that qualify for support and a focus on four themes:
- water
- security and the rule of law
- food security
- sexual and reproductive health and rights
While a lot of NICHE projects already address one or several of the above themes it means that future projects will do so to an even larger extent. The effects of the new policy for NICHE and NFP in terms of funding are not yet clear, but will be announced on Prinsjesdag when the Finance Minister presents his budget for the new year to the House of Representatives.
Now on to the contents of this issue.
200 new ambassadors in the making
On 26 and 27 May Nuffic hosted the second edition of the Holland Alumni Conference, commissioned by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science.
The conference in The Hague offered 200 participants, including 100 NFP alumni, from 40 countries the chance to expand their international knowledge networks, take career-oriented workshops and return home as 'Study in Holland ambassadors'.
NICHE workshops
In our efforts to succesfully address cross-cutting themes in NICHE we organised a TVET workshop in Utrecht for Dutch implementers.
We also organised a financial workshop in Uganda, in collaboration with PricewaterhouseCoopers, for project managers and financial officers in Uganda, South Sudan and South Africa. As you can read in the report the workshop was very hands-on thanks to a 'learn by doing' approach.
Finally, we give a quick overview of the outputs of our three capacity building programmes in 2010, an item on a new greenhouse at Jimna University made possible through an NPT-funded project and a short review of the first NFP application round fully completed using Scholarships Online.
We hope you will enjoy the read.
Kind regards,
Joep Houterman
Director Capacity Building and Scholarships
