2020 Africa Research Excellence Fund

Since 2015 the AREF have offered potentially life-changing opportunities to more than 200 researchers from 30 countries across Africa, setting them on the path to leading their own research teams within the continent.

Below are some of our key achievements to date:

27 researchers have benefited from an AREF Research Development Fellowship, with placements at 17 research centres in Africa and Europe.

Of the 20 researchers who have completed their Fellowship so far, nearly half of them have already gone on to secure additional research funding, amounting to £2 million.

141 researchers have benefited from one of our grant-writing workshops.

20 additional Fellows have benefitted from the 18-month AREF Excell Researcher and Leadership Development Programme. 

6 African institutions have strengthened their own research capacity through the Excell programme.

10 researchers have benefited from our Towards Leadership Programme, commissioned by three Global Challenge Research Fund networks.

11 researchers have benefited  from our Communications Masterclass.

5 scholarships were awarded to AREF fellows to attend the Introductory Course in Epidemiology & Medical Statistics (The Gambia), organised by London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

21 AREF beneficiaries have gone on to win funding, amounting to £5 million, from the Wellcome Trust, National Institutes of Health, European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP), AESA, Royal Society UK, Tropical Health and Education Trust (THET).