Accra: President John Dramani Mahama has praised the Africa's Higher Education Centers of Excellence (ACE) for their role in addressing significant challenges faced by higher education on the continent. In his remarks at the opening of the 2025 ACE Forum in Accra, President Mahama highlighted the program's success in fostering innovation, nurturing expertise, and strengthening institutional capacities in sectors such as health, agriculture, engineering, and applied sciences.
According to Ghana News Agency, the three-day event, themed 'ACE@10: Celebrating a Decade of Impact and Innovation of Africa Centers of Excellence Programme,' is co-organized by the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission, the Association of African Universities (AAU), the Inter-University Council for East Africa (IUCEA), with support from the World Bank and the French Development Agency (AFD). The Forum seeks to review the progress of the ACEs over the last decade, highlighting key successes, research breakthroughs, innovations, and impacts.
President Mahama noted that with over 80 centers across more than 20 countries, the ACE initiative has shown the power of collaboration among nations, institutions, and development partners to create exponential impact. From advancing research in infectious diseases and renewable energy to driving innovation in agriculture and digital technology, ACE has become a symbol of regional integration and cooperation.
He emphasized that the program's results-based approach, linking funding to tangible outcomes, has elevated academic standards, driven institutional reforms, attracted global partnerships, and expanded opportunities for thousands of postgraduate students across Africa. President Mahama remarked that ACE has made universities more relevant to their communities.
Through shared thematic networks, inter-university mobility, and academic-industry partnerships, the ACE initiative has facilitated joint research, co-created curricula, and fostered innovation ecosystems that might have been challenging to establish independently. By leveraging economies of scale and promoting peer learning, this collaborative framework has enhanced regional capacity while addressing national development priorities.
President Mahama stated that the future of higher education in Africa-and globally-depends on collaborative efforts to unlock talents, transfer knowledge, and build a resilient, skilled workforce ready to drive sustainable development across the continent. He noted that Ghana hosts some of the most impactful centers of excellence under the ACE program, including the West African Centre for Crop Improvement (WACCI), the West African Centre for Cell Biology of Infectious Pathogens (WACCBIP), and the West African Genetic Medicine Centre (WAGMC) at the University of Ghana.
WACCI, since its inception, has been a key player in enhancing agricultural productivity in West Africa, focusing on crop improvement and empowering local farmers through advanced training. The center has produced numerous highly trained graduates who now lead agricultural research, positively impacting food systems in Ghana and the broader West African sub-region. President Mahama expressed optimism about the ACE program's prospects, stating that the demand for research-led solutions, skilled professionals, and regionally relevant innovations continues to grow across Africa. ACE Centers are uniquely positioned to meet this demand, serving as hubs of excellence driving socio-economic transformation.
