ONLINE: Africa at Noon

media release: Every Wednesday at noon — since 1973! — African Studies Program faculty, students, and community members have gathered for AFRICA AT NOON, a one-hour weekly lecture series bringing diverse African research from scholars around the world to a campus and community audience.

April 27: “A Paradigm Shift in Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation in Africa”

This lecture marks our desire to seek ways that will make the African continent more resilient to degradation of the environment and the loss of biodiversity observed. My presentation will be structured around four main points. Firstly, I will briefly define the key concepts of this contribution. Then I will draw up a succinct critical balance sheet of the environmental problems and the conservation of biodiversity in Africa. From this balance sheet, I will identify the prescriptions that are applied on the continent and those that do not produce the expected results. Those prescriptions even sometimes tend to amplify the problems. The last part of our presentation proposes alternative solutions to these approaches which, on a concrete field, mark their limits. In other words, we will suggest means to increase the resilience of the continent against environmental degradation and loss of biodiversity.

Médard Obiang Ebanega is a teacher and researcher at Omar Bongo University in the Department of Geography and Maritime Science in Libreville Gabon since 2005. Member of LAGRAC (Laboratoire de Géomatique de Recherche Appliquée et Conseils), he has published a book entitled “L’homme et la conservation de la nature: le Complexe d’Aires protégées de Gamba” and is a co-author of several articles on remote sensing, mangrove conservation, elephant conservation, air quality monitoring, waste management, land use and urban planning. He is also an environmental expert who has worked on a project to rehabilitate and build drainage canals in Port-Gentil, on a project to rehabilitate the greater Libreville drinking water network, and on various impact assessment projects. Member of OeL (Editions Oudjat en Ligne), he is also the founder and the president of We Need NGO since its creation in 2015. In December 2021, he became the first president of the Gabonese Environmental federation of NGOs named “OKIRI.”

The Africa at Noon series will take place virtually this semester until further notice. All are welcome. This event will take place on Zoom. Spring semester info:

https://uwmadison.zoom.us/j/91993903821?pwd=NElOU2Zza1QrZUFwUjhvNkxlazhNZz09

Webinar ID: 919 9390 3821; Passcode: 965483

Or One tap mobile : US: +13126266799,,91993903821#,,,,*965483# or +19292056099,,91993903821#,,,,*965483#

Or Telephone: Dial(for higher quality, dial a number based on your current location):

US: +1 312 626 6799 or +1 929 205 6099 or +1 301 715 8592 or +1 253 215 8782 or +1 346 248 7799 or +1 669 900 6833

International numbers available: https://uwmadison.zoom.us/u/acmMd7jtpf

You can view available recordings of past Africa at Noon webinars using the link(s) on the event page.