Ghana has been one of the University of Bonn’s strategic focus countries for many years now. Numerous researchers are already collaborating with partners in the country, and a great many relationships have grown and developed over the years. By joining the alliance, the University will now be transferring this cooperation into a consortium of other higher-education institutions from NRW, unlocking new possibilities for developing existing projects further, securing new partners and preparing large-scale joint initiatives.
“International research needs more than just subject overlaps,” explains Professor Birgit Ulrike Münch, Vice Rector for International Affairs at the University of Bonn. “It needs trust, reliable structures and people who forge links, and this is precisely where the Ghana-NRW University Alliance comes in: It connects our University’s longstanding relationships in Ghana with a higher-education network in the state and thus puts our researchers in an even better position to research, teach and secure funding together.”
Those who are already working with a higher-education or research institution in Ghana will be able to expand their existing pool of contacts and integrate new projects more easily into a wider network, while anyone looking to launch a partnership from scratch will find guidance and suitable contacts faster through the alliance and will benefit from insights into the experience gained by other member universities. This common framework can be key, especially for large-scale collaborative projects.
Regional office makes cooperation easier
Playing a pivotal role is the alliance’s regional office in Accra. The first port of call for researchers, students and higher-education institutions from both Ghana and North Rhine-Westphalia, it brings people together who are tackling similar questions or keen to get joint projects off the ground. The office puts people in touch with one another, supports existing partnerships and helps to build new ones as well as enabling mobility schemes, joint teaching formats and research projects to be prepared and implemented in a more targeted way. The office also provides additional support to students, connecting up Germans and Ghanaians taking part in an exchange and thus making it easier for them to get ready for their stay abroad. It serves as a point of contact for students from Bonn faced with challenges or questions during their stay abroad and, it is hoped, will improve the processes involved in applying for a visa by engaging in regular dialogue with the authorities that issue them.
Thus the regional office combines three main roles: representing the interests of the researchers, coordinating matters among the various institutions involved and ensuring day-to-day implementation. It has been led by Justice Kofi Bimpeh since July 2026. “In many international partnerships, early access is key to a project’s progress,” Vice Rector Münch explains. “Who are the right partners? What structures are in place on the ground? What are the potential funding formats? “The regional office in Accra helps our researchers to answer questions like these early on.” The alliance is also raising the University of Bonn’s international profile, with its activities in Ghana now becoming part of a sizable higher-education network that pools expertise and speaks with a single voice to partners and funding organizations.
Longstanding partnerships laying firm foundations
The University of Bonn will be contributing a broad base of long-established relationships to the alliance, having worked for many years with leading Ghanaian universities including the University of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology and the University of Cape Coast. At the latter, Professor Benjamin Kofi Nyarko also serves as a Bonn University Ambassador, strengthening academic dialogue in the process.
The partnerships that have already been established extend well beyond individual projects, with researchers from both countries coming together to tackle issues of global health and pandemic prevention, sustainable development, climate action and environmental protection, food security, and biodiversity. These are complemented by partnerships in the natural and social sciences and the humanities. The links established are also opening up important avenues for access for early-career researchers: Doctoral partnerships, summer schools, exchange programs, scholarships and fellowships all mean that they do not have to wait long before gaining international research experience.
The seven members of the Ghana-NRW University Alliance are: the University of Bonn; the University of Cologne (coordinating institution); Ruhr-University Bochum; TU Dortmund University; the University of Duisburg-Essen; Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf; and the University of Siegen.
Contact at the University of Bonn
Mira Christ-Zöller
zoeller@verwaltung.uni-bonn.de
Contact at the Ghana-NRW University Alliance
Justice Kofi Bimpeh
Ghana-NRW University Alliance
Accra, Ghana
Email: jbimpeh@uni-koeln.de
Website: https://uni.koeln/CZ6XM
