Initiatives of Operations Research Society of Eastern Africa
Initiatives
Over the years, some of the key initiatives by ORSEA have included holding annual international conferences since 2003 (except in 2007 and 2017); celebrating its 10-year anniversary in 2014; starting a semi-annual ORSEA Journal; launching a book on OR; and setting up Master of Science (MSc) and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) programmes in OR. Since 2003 when ORSEA conferences were initiated, an average 40 papers have been presented in each conference and about 120 faculty members (not including PhD and masters students) have attended the conferences each year. Over the years, the themes and sub-themes have varied, driven by challenges and demands within various sectors of the economy (public and private) particularly within the East African Community. Due to COVID-19 pandemic, the annual conferences were not held in 2020 and 2021. However, the 16th ORSEA annual conference will held later this year at Faculty of Business and Management Sciences – University of Nairobi. The theme of the conference will be ‘Leveraging on Operations Research for the Implementation of Africa Continental Free Trade’.
The semi-annual ORSEA Journal was started in 2011 and 16 issues of it have so far been released with an average of four papers per journal. In addition, a book titled “Operations Research in Developing Countries: The Case of Eastern Africa” was peer reviewed and published in 2014 as part of the 10-year celebrations since the inception of ORSEA. The sub-themes included case studies in OR applications in specific organizational and business areas; hard and soft OR; mixed or integrated approaches; community OR; innovations in OR techniques; innovations in analytical support for OR; experiences and innovations in the teaching of OR; and emergent issues and future of OR in developing countries.
The PhD programme supported by the three business schools has commenced and is being coordinated and taught at the University of Dar-es-Salaam Business School. The programme will lead to the award of PhD in OR degree of the University of Dar-es-Salaam and will be offered as a coursework and thesis programme; for the entire programme students will take a total of eight courses and will end by writing a thesis in OR. The goal of the programme is to enhance teaching of OR as well as train and provide academic staff to serve the East Africa region and Africa as a whole. This initiative was due to the realization that OR, despite its importance, has not been taught as a core discipline within the three business schools. Indeed, the teaching of OR at undergraduate and post-graduate levels has been limited and no school offers specialization in OR. The three business schools will be able to train and develop students at post-graduate levels who specialize in OR for public and private sectors, business community, government, general public as well as academia. To this end, we are happy to report that two PhD students in operations research have so far graduated.
The masters programme will be offered, by each business school, as a two-year degree programme and will lead to the award of the MSc in OR degree. Students will take a total of 18 courses and will end by writing a practical project, which will have the same weight as a full semester and therefore students will take six courses in each semester.
Potential Members
Today, ORSEA is a regional body for Eastern Africa whose founder members are Makerere University Business School, University of Dar-es-Salaam Business School, and University of Nairobi faculty of Business Management Sciences. Each participating country (Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda) has already established a country chapter. Relevant schools/faculties in Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, Ethiopia, and Democratic Republic of Congo are being approached to soon join ORSEA.
