Afrique One-ASPIRE delegates attended a risk management workshop in Nairobi, Kenya from 26 to 27 February 2018. This workshop was organized by the African Academy of Sciences. The goals of this meeting were (i) to develop a strategy/framework for risk management within the DELTAS programme, (ii) to foster a risk management culture at home institutions and (iii) to provide tools to develop a plan for risk analysis and monitoring for programme implementation within DELTAS. The definition of risk is the effect of uncertainty on objectives. To deal with the risks, the strategy consists in the six steps outlined below. 

During the workshop, the Centre Suisse de Recherches Scientifiques en Côte d’Ivoire (CSRS), the grant holder of Afrique One-ASPIRE, was shown as a good example of how to manage major risks. Indeed, during Côte d’Ivoire’s military crisis from 2009 to 2011, many international organizations either left the country or ceased operations temporarily. The CSRS kept going due to its experience with earlier crises, its contingency plans, its strong links with local communities, strong partnership with local institutions and universities, international partners and funders and its neutrality. Due to the closure of banks, the Directorate of Afrique One moved the financial management of the CSRS temporarily to its partner institution Nogouchi in Ghana to execute transfers from there. Because CSRS maintained projects and strengthened institutional development during the crisis, it has been able to obtain a new generation of major projects and programmes. (See: Research in a war zone. Nature 474(7353):569-71 · June 2011)