A virtual meeting was held between COMSATS and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) officials on 8th January 2020, that was materialized as a result of Agency’s deep interest in COMSATS’ forthcoming General Meeting and Accra Forum on S&T for Sustainable Development to be held under the patronage of Hon. Nana Akufo-Addo, President of Ghana and Chairperson of COMSATS.

From COMSATS’ side, Dr. S.M. Junaid Zaidi, Executive Director; Ambassador Shahid Kamal, Advisor (Climate Change); Mr. Nisar Ahmad, Deputy Director (Systems); and Mr. Farhan Ansari, Senior Assistant Director (Programmes) attended the meeting. Mr. Abdullah Alkulaib, Regional Specialist, Regional Bureau for Africa at UNDP; and Ms. Ronata, participated from the other side.

Familiarizing the UNDP officials with the organization and its statutory activities, Dr. Zaidi and Ambassador Kamal shed light on the objectives, expected level of participation, and anticipated outcomes of the Accra Forum. They considered the participation and support of the relevant agencies of United Nations crucial for realizing the objectives of the event. The UNDP officials took keen interest in the event, and expressed willingness to cooperate with COMSATS and the Government of Ghana in this regard. The two sides also discussed the specific areas of science and technology to be covered by the event.

Mr. Abdullah Alkulaib informed COMSATS’ officials about UNDP’s Accelerator Lab project, which is active in 50 countries, including 30 in African region. The project is focused at scaling up the grass-root technologies for facilitating the development of countries of the South. He invited COMSATS’ officials to visit UNDP’s Accelerator Lab in Pakistan in order to explore avenues of cooperation.

The meeting ended with the resolve to further the collaboration through potential channels.