Collaboration Research Validation Workshop at Hawassa University.
Hawassa University hosts a validation workshop on a research project conducted in collaboration with CORDAID Ethiopia entitled "Approaches to the Enhancement of Ownership of Community Assets to Reduce Inefficiencies in the use of Assets: The Case of Selected Pastoral and Agropastoral Areas of SNNPRS, Oromia and Somali Regional States" at Hawassa Rori hotel, on 24/10/2023.
Dr.Ing. Fisiha Getachew, Vice President for Academic Affairs at HU, officiated the workshop where he pointed out that HU has been expanding in scope and capacity since its establishment nearly half a century ago. He underscored the need to focus on quality of education, research and community engagements rather than quantity.
Dr. Tafesse Matewos, Vice President for Research and Technology Transfer at HU and a researcher in the team, outlined Hawassa University's remarkable legacy of 47 years of commitment to education, research, and community services in Ethiopia. Dr. Tafesse mentioned that the University currently has 82 active collaborative projects significantly contributing to its research, teaching, community service, and capacity development endeavors.
Speaking about the validation workshop, Dr. Tafesse explained that the main goal was to present findings and strengthen the outputs with feedbacks from scholars and stakeholders. He introduced the collaborative research project from its inception through the stages of progress stressing the need to capitalize on good practices and identify challenges during adoption or implementation of social innovations.
Dr. Mulye Girma, the research project's principal investigator (PI) presented the details of the project with findings and recommendations on the way forward for validation. Dr. Mulye stated that the project was aimed at measuring the degree of uptake of induced innovations, investigating the level of sense of community ownership, identifying major factors influencing the sense of community ownership, identifying essential good practices, and identifying major factors behind the inefficiencies at Dasenech, Shinile and Meda Wellabu pastoral and Agro pastoral areas.
The RESET Plus Innovation Fund project Officer, Mr. Zerihun Kassa, said that 13 innovations were implemented by EU's RESET Plus Innovation Fund, financed by the European Union and implemented by Cordaid Ethiopia, in collaboration with Fair and Sustainable Ethiopia across five regions. He also mentioned that researchers from HU won two of the five calls and successfully executed the studies in a short period. He expressed a hearty appreciation to the research team and the university administration for their impressive commitment and professionalism in the process.
The research was conducted to assess efficiency of technologies and systems implemented for boosting ownership of community assets found in SNNPRS (Dassench), Oromia (Meda Wellabu) and Somalia (Shinile) regional States.
Dr. Samuel Jilo, Vice Present for Administration & Student Services at HU and one of the researchers, facilitated the Q & A session where participants had the opportunity to reflect on the presentation.
