Africa-Europe Health R&D Conference 2026

Health research priorities, set by Africa and Europe together

The independent interface between the two continents on who decides which health research gets funded and for whom.

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An initiative of Raisonnances Humanistes

19partner institutions consulted

3working sessions

10policy-ready proposals

2027the year programme choices are made

01The gap

The evidence is in Africa. The decisions are not.

African research centres produce sound data on the diseases that weigh most on the continent. Yet the large research programmes still set their priorities largely without them.

In Africa

The evidence

Surveillance data, clinical research and field knowledge on the diseases that weigh most.

No structured channel

Where programmes are written

The decisions

Strategic plans, work programmes, expert groups and calls for research.

The data exists. The channel does not.

02The moment

2027: both continents write their programmes

Africa is implementing its science strategy to 2034. Europe is preparing its next research programme, for 2028 to 2034. What both write from 2027 will shape a decade of research.

2025Global health funding cut back
The window2026The Rabat Framework
2027Programmes are written
2028FP10 begins
2034Horizon of STISA 2034 and FP10

03Our answer

A direct channel to programme writers

We bring African institutions into the places where research priorities are set. We turn their priorities into proposals that programme writers on both sides can use.

Africa

African institutions

Research centres and universities
Academies of science
Field and civil society organisations

African UnionSTISA 2034

Interface

Europe

European institutions

Research institutes and networks
Global health organisations
Advocacy and policy groups

European UnionFP10, 2028 to 2034

04How we work

Five functions, from first meeting to follow-up

From the first conversation to the final decision, we stay with each proposal.

Convene

Research institutions, policy actors and field organisations from both continents, around one table.

Translate

Their priorities, into the working language of those who write programmes and calls.

Co-carry

Proposals, jointly with the institutions that shaped them.

Advocate

With the African Union and the European Union, when choices are made.

Follow through

What becomes of each proposal, reported back to those who wrote it.

Each cycle feeds the next.

05Our difference

We act before priorities are written

Many actors fund, train or deliver once priorities exist. We work earlier, where priorities are written.

The usual approachOur approach

Where we act

After priorities are set: funding, training, delivery.

Before, where priorities are written.

Who holds the pen

Programmes designed in one place, partners consulted later.

African institutions define the priorities. We build the channel.

Direction

One continent's agenda.

Africa and Europe, in both directions.

What we deliver

Reports and declarations.

Policy-ready proposals in the drafters' own language.

Our stake

A programme to fund or defend.

None. We are independent.

We do not fund or conduct research. We change who sits at the table when it is designed.

06Already at work

Consultation, working sessions, a framework

Consultation with partners, three working sessions and one framework, launched in Rabat.

April to September 2026

Consultation with partners

Institutions from both continents set out where the system fails and what would fix it.

October 2026

Three working sessions

Online sessions with African and European institutions on research and innovation, policy and governance, financing and deployment.

10 December 2026

The Rabat Framework

Ten policy-ready proposals, launched at the Founding Conference.

2027

Into the programmes

The proposals go to those who write research programmes in Africa and Europe.

October 2026, online

Three working sessions

Research and innovation

Why sound African surveillance data rarely reaches the design of research calls, and how to move from data sharing to collaborative data use.

Policy and governance

Which mechanisms would let African institutions shape strategies and work programmes from the start, expert group membership included.

Financing and deployment

What it takes for validated interventions to reach national health systems, with data sovereignty as a precondition. This strand yields orientations.

07Beyond 2026

After Rabat: a forum, an index, a network

The 2026 conference opens a permanent Africa-Europe platform. Health is its anchor for the years ahead.

Platform

A permanent forum

A standing place where African and European institutions shape research priorities together, cycle after cycle.

In development

An annual index

Measuring how far institutions from high-burden settings take part in setting global health research priorities.

Network

A multi-stakeholder network

Research institutions, global health organisations, civil society and development finance, working as one network.

Founding Conference

Rabat, 10 December 2026

One day with around fifty senior participants from Africa and Europe, held under non-attribution. The Rabat Framework is launched there.

Date: 10 December 2026
Place: Rabat, Morocco.
Access: By invitation only

Behind the initiative

Amal Derqaoui

President and Founder, Raisonnances Humanistes

In 2025, as the financing and governance of global health were reshaped, she turned Raisonnances Humanistes towards one question: who decides what health research on Africa studies next?

Join the network

You work on health research between Africa and Europe, in research, policy, funding or the field? Let's talk.