Connect with South Africa
Jacquelene Friedenthal, the Science and Technology Counsellor at the Embassy of Switzerland in Pretoria, envisions strengthening Swiss collaboration in South Africa and expanding across Africa in the coming years. She aims to focus on clean technology, renewable energy, Medtech, and life sciences, emphasizing the potential for impactful collaborations to address global and national challenges, all in line with the goal of connecting Switzerland with Africa and promoting a better tomorrow through innovation and research.
What is your vision for the STO in South Africa for the next two years?
I joined the Swiss Embassy in South Africa in 2010 as the first Science and Technology Officer on the African Continent. I was working on the Swiss Dossier at the Department of Science and Innovation and witnessed the collaboration from 2005 until 2010 as part of the South African team and now as part of the Swiss team. The first joint call for proposals in 2008 only yielded three applications to the extent that we had to relaunch the call. Today, 15 years later, the Swiss collaboration in South Africa is seen as one of the vanguards of bilateral collaboration. The STO is set to benchmark science diplomacy with South Africa moving frontiers in education, research and innovation. Switzerland has established the first bilateral research chair for South Africa; building thematic ecosystems touching the pillars of education, research, innovation and investment; ground-breaking work with Swiss Universities of Applied Sciences and Entrepreneurs; and being the first country outside of Europe with which the Swiss National Science Foundation signed a lead agency agreement in 2020.
How is this linked to my vision for the following years? In the next few years, and now with the BRICS Block, Africa will move from Cinderella to centre stage concerning research and innovation. In addition to our well-established joint research projects is the opportunity for Swiss Entrepreneurs to profit from the applied innovation opportunities in Africa. I have witnessed, over the years, the excellent innovations from Switzerland relevant to the African market. I envision deepening our collaboration with South Africa and expanding our collaboration with Africa.
What are the trending sectors wherein you can curate impactful collaborations with Switzerland?
If there is one country that lives up to the words of Benjamin Franklin, that out of adversity comes opportunity. South Africa has been bedevilled with several challenges, such as load-shedding. The upside is that academia, the private sector, civil society and entrepreneurs are pulling all stops in being agile to address the lack of reliable energy. The result is that South Africa can be a significant player in clean technology, renewable energy and energy efficiency. It is here that the opportunity lies for impactful collaboration not only in photovoltaic but also in hydrogen fuel. Another area to drill down is that of Medtech.
Already in 2008, South Africa was seen as a preferred partner for Switzerland to collaborate in life science. The combination of digitalisation, Medtech and healthcare allows us to deepen our roots in life sciences. Astonishing is the speed at which Africa innovates in the frontier technologies of the fourth industrial revolution. The opportunity for Switzerland to co-create with Africa, investment opportunities and market access are encouraging. Although different from the rest of the world, we don’t have trending sectors down here, but rather a focus on addressing global and national challenges. Within these challenges lies the Medtech, Lifesciences, and Clean Technology sectors with the cross-sector of the 4th Industrial Revolution.
How would it contribute towards the network's overall goal #ConnectingTomorrow
With our goal of connecting tomorrow, we can connect Switzerland with Africa. Evident of the African opportunity in education, research and innovation is the active Africa portfolio of EPFL, the University of Basel and the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute. A central area of the Swissnex #ConnectingTomorrow aims to bring the Swiss Universities of Applied Sciences in a close collaborative environment with Africa. While the collaboration has grown in recent years, we’ve just barely begun to scratch the surface. The unique thing about the Embassy of Switzerland in South Africa is that we are an integrated embassy with collaboration between FDFA, S-GE, SERI and SECO. Within this network, we have the unique opportunity of #ConnectingTomorrow Switzerland across Africa.
Lastly, how do you want your current and potential Swiss partners to be part of your journey/vision?
We have always prided ourselves in our support to our Swiss partners. No matter how small or big, we are here to serve the objective of bringing Switzerland to Africa. The close collaboration we enjoy with the Swiss Leading House has put us in a unique construct in supporting our Swiss partners. Switzerland and Africa are two diverse countries with vastly different cultures, which allows us to serve as a bridge towards collaboration for a common goal of a better tomorrow. A milestone for me in supporting our Swiss partners is witnessing how Swiss scholars can undertake their studies in deep rural areas by applying their high-tech innovations, as one example. We wish to continue to add value to Swiss academia and entrepreneurs through hands-on research and innovation with concrete outcomes.
Connect with
Embassy of Switzerland in Pretoria
225 Vaele Street,
New Muckleneuk 0181,
Pretoria, South Africa