Cambridge Node
Harnessing global Africa expertise to shape healthier, climate-resilient urban futures in African cities.
Mission
We mobilise diaspora expertise and build evidence, coalitions and skills to shape healthier, climate-resilient urban futures in African cities.
What we do
The Cambridge Africa Diaspora Centre for Healthy Hopeful Urban Futures is a node of the networked UrbanBetter Academy. Based at the IMS Epidemiology, University of Cambridge, the Centre draws on Cambridge’s interdisciplinary research, policy and innovation ecosystem while mobilising Global Africa’s diaspora expertise to advance healthier, climate-resilient urban development in African cities.
As part of the Academy’s distributed model, the Centre connects city-level action across Africa with diaspora-based research excellence, ensuring reciprocal flows of knowledge, influence and institutional capacity.
Scope of work
With work spanning urban health, climate and planetary health, the Centre builds evidence, coalitions and skills through transdisciplinary research, training, leadership development and knowledge diplomacy working in partnership with African universities, city leaders, youth-centred networks and practitioners.
Our thematic focus areas are:
Main activities
Research
We co‑produce action‑focused research at the nexus of health, climate and urbanisation, with Cityzens Hubs and city governments, rooted in local priorities.
Skills
We build intergenerational leadership pipelines among youth, practitioners and policymakers to anticipate, design, and act for healthier, climate-resilient cities.
Coalitions
Through Policy Salons, we work in partnership with Africa-based partners to bring African city governments, civil society and global researchers together to share priorities and surface knowledge gaps. Our Masterclasses showcase promising practice and unusual coalitions across public, private and multilateral sectors to raise ambition for transformative urban action. Working with UrbanBetter, we also support high-level annual Sankofa intergenerational dialogue to foster solidarity and accelerate collective action for healthy, climate-resilient urban development.
Diaspora Knowledge Hub
A cross-cutting UrbanBetter initiative dedicated to mobilising diaspora intellectual capital through transnational knowledge diplomacy.
The Cambridge Africa Diaspora Centre serves as the anchor node for this platform, providing the institutional base for structured diaspora engagement and convening partners across Africa and the diaspora.
The Hub is designed as a long-term engagement ecosystem that creates reciprocal value and delivers triple wins: for Africa, for the UK and other diasporan countries of residence, and for advancing solutions to globally relevant, transboundary urban health and climate challenges.
Contribution within Cambridge
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The Centre aims to embed Africa-informed urban health and climate perspectives more visibly within global research, policy and practice conversations convened through Cambridge while strengthening reciprocal flows of knowledge and solidarity between Africa, its diaspora and the global.
The Centre contributes to Cambridge’s research and teaching ecosystem by linking urban health and climate scholarship with city-level priorities across Africa.
It creates structured pathways for research engagement with African city governments, civil society and youth networks, helping surface questions grounded in lived realities.
It strengthens opportunities for applied, policy-relevant research at the intersection of health, climate and urbanisation.
It develops training initiatives in areas such as citizen science, science diplomacy and anticipatory leadership, with exploration of a Master’s in Cities Administration and Leadership for Planetary Health.
It provides avenues for students and scholars to connect academic work with advocacy, coalition-building and policy engagement.
It supports deeper Africa and diaspora partnerships within Cambridge’s global engagement portfolio.
It contributes to emerging practice in transnational knowledge exchange by mobilising diaspora intellectual capital alongside African institutional partnerships.
Hosted by
IMS Epidemiology University of Cambridge
Our partners
Funders
Latest news
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Where to find us
University of Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine, Box 285 Institute of Metabolic Science, Cambridge Biomedical Campus Cambridge, CB2 0QQ, United Kingdom
