National University-Industry Forum

Introduction

The National University Industry Forum (NUIF) was established in 2023 by the Ethiopian Institute of Textile and Fashion Technology (EiTEX) to strengthen the partnership between different stakeholders through a workshop or platform that brings all stakeholders together to interact on the main challenges of the textile and leather subsector and find out a common ground to work on the future. In addition, this Forum provides a unique networking opportunity for professionals from industry and universities for knowledge and technology transfer opportunities and explore opportunities for further collaborations in areas of as intellectual property licensing, research and development, training and consultancy, community service, and technology transfer, internship /externship programs, sustainable businesses, and job creation among many other areas.

Objective 

The main objective of this forum is to strengthen networking with stakeholders (Government, Industry, Academia, and other development partners) and discuss the current challenges and future directions in the textile and leather sectors to enhance industrial development. In this regard, the following points will be addressed:

-  Building collaborative links with industry, analyzing the factors critical for bridging the gap between what industry expects from graduates & what institutes deliver, and discussing the role of industry-institute interaction in enhancing the academic delivery and building our nation.

-  Bring Industry and  Academia to work closure to produce more entrepreneurs to achieve the goal of the nation and the content.

-  To identify whether the universities are working with the industry in collaboration, if so in what areas do they collaborate and at what extent are they working for the realization of the objectives of the link and implementation of the government higher education policy.

-  Planning future development of the university in consultation with industry and introducing new programs and technologies in collaboration with industry and developing a future plan and setting a common goal by discussing the current scenario of the university-industry relationships

-  To address industry/university problems for their research and consultancy-based solutions.

-  Suggest Industry-driven demands to be included in the curriculum so that the students can be trained as per the industry requirement.

-  To identify the challenges that impede the university-industry linkages and measure the level of the linkages.

-  To increase the memory of understanding with partners based on the selected collaborative areas. 

-  Suggest Industry-driven demands to be included in the curriculum so that the students can be trained as per the industry requirement.