The University of Ulster has won funding to set up a partnership with colleges in one of Africa's poorest countries - Malawi - to help educate and train students for jobs in urban and regional planning.

The Education Partnerships in Africa (EPA) scheme, sponsored by the Department for Employment and Learning and managed by the British Council, has awarded a grant of £59,700 to run the project over 18 months beginning in autumn 2009.

The partnership involves the University of Ulster and two higher education institutions in Malawi – Mzuzu University and Malawi Polytechnic based in Blantyre.

The main aim of the project is to assist in the development of existing urban and regional planning degree programmes and help lead to the employment of graduates in this sector.

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A secondary aim is that the degree programmes assisted through this partnership will become models of this kind of education thoughout southern Africa.

Dr Neale Blair, a lecturer in the Built Environment Research Institute at Ulster, is leading the project.

"We're very excited to be working with our partners at Mzuzu University and Malawi Polytechnic to overcome this mindset by developing entrepreneurship training programmes for students on urban and regional planning programmes."

Dr Blair believes that the partnership project provides a wonderful opportunity for local academics to put their expertise and wealth of knowledge to good use and help a developing country.

"At the University of Ulster, built environment programmes are delivered through a public/private/academic partnership approach, ensuring our programmes are relevant both in terms of specialist subject knowledge and also to the profession in the UK – an approach that brings international employment opportunities to our graduates.

"This EPA project partnership will benefit urban and regional planning education both in Malawi and also in Northern Ireland, through mutual learning and understanding."

(PR/BMcc)