HEI-ICI SUCCEED project was a success
The HEI-ICI SUCCEED project was finalized in December 2015 with a seminar held in Yangon, Myanmar. Activities were coordinated together with FFRC’s local partner university; Yangon Technical University (YTU). Also colleagues from Royal University of Phnom Penh (RUPP), Institute of Technology of Cambodia (ITC) and National University of Laos (NUOL) attended the event. The SUCCEED final seminar was organized in a continuum with a scientific conference simultaneously held by YTU on 12-13th December. FFRC’s delegation included Regional Advisor for Mekong and the Caribbean Mr. Mika Korkeakoski, and Project Researcher Noora Stenholm.
The 6th International Conference on Science and Engineering gathered participants all over Myanmar as well as Australia, Korea, Japan and Finland. Mr. Mika Korkeakoski was honoured to give a keynote speech on energy demand and growth modelling in the Mekong countries. He argued that the development of the economic structure in each country can have a major impact on the energy demand and its sources, thus also further on carbon emissions and the ability to contribute to global climate change mitigation efforts.
The two-day conference also included several parallel sessions in which SUCCEED project partners. Dr. Po Kimtho from RUPP, Cambodia, and Dr. Keophousone Phonhalath, NUOL, Laos, were presenting their papers.
The closing seminar of the project, held right after the conference on 15-16th December, gathered staff and students from YTU as well as project partners. Unfortunately several stakeholders invited to the event were unable to attend. The closing seminar discussed the lessons learned and results achieved in the project through a capacity assessment conducted during 2013-2015. The results indicated positive learning results and a positive and needed impact in curricula development in the partner universities. The topics covered in the trainings in this three-year project included energy modelling, renewable energy technologies, climate change, environmental impact assessment, and research methodology, to name a few. Participants comprised of university staff, teachers, PhD and master’s students. For example at YTU the trainings were hugely popular among students. The capacity assessment functioned as an evaluation of the project results back to the funding agency, yet also provided crucial information to the project management in order to adjust trainings accordingly. Similar capacity assessment and self-evaluation is being planned also in the upcoming SDF capacity building projects.
The latter half of the seminar discussed new initiatives and funding opportunities in the fields of research and capacity building in renewable energy, sustainable development, green growth and climate change. FFRC actively seeks new projects and collaboration possibilities in the Mekong region and particularly in Myanmar where it has started work rather recently. Potential funding instruments include the Horizon2020 programme commissioned by EU, Eramus+ Capacity building for Higher Education also commissioned by EU, other European development agencies, as well as the Ministry for Foreign Affair of Finland. This seminar laid ground for the preparations of an Erasmus+ CBHE project aiming at providing further energy and climate education in the partner institutions while including innovative teaching tools and better south-south learning and knowledge exchange. The application was successfully submitted to EU in mid-February. SUCCEED project was successfully reported and audited in early 2016.
FFRC received financial support for the travels from FinCEAL+ programme.