Foresight Institute of
Research and Translation
...aspiring to uniquely contribute to a high quality of life for the people of Rwanda and other African Countries
Founded
2018
Lives Impacted
1M+
Divisions
7 Specialized
Our Commitment
We provide innovative research and
transformative solutions.
Simulate Interest
Stimulate interest in life science research and other relevant disciplines among the academic community, graduate students, and the public.
Wealth & Job Creation
Promote wealth and job creation, translate and disseminate research findings to support the well-being of people and economic growth.
Collaboration
Cooperate and partner with relevant government and non-governmental agencies to promote research and translation for the public good.
Capacity Building
Promote postgraduate and postdoctoral training, support capacity development, collaboration, networking, and global exchange.
Empowering Africa’s Future since 2018
A trusted institution with a multidisciplinary approach to research and development, delivering impactful solutions in health, economy, environment, and agriculture.
Certified
Excellence
Impactful
Solutions
Strategic Framework
Our Strategic Pillars
To achieve our vision, we operate through these core pillars that guide every initiative and research endeavor.
Knowledge Creation
Pioneering new research frameworks to drive African development.
Teaching & Inspiration
Empowering the next generation of researchers and innovators.
Innovation & Translation
Translating complex research into real-world sustainable solutions.
Socioeconomic Transformation
Accelerating progress through strategic sector support.
Development Ecosystem
Fostering collaborative environments for sustainable growth.
Our Objectives
Translating vision into actionable outcomes across Rwanda and beyond.
Promote research and translation of findings for development in Rwanda.
Develop critical productive capacity to support facilities for growing and accelerating key sector programmes.
Engage students, scientists, technology experts and relevant stakeholders in creative research and productivity.
Deploy innovative strategies in support of food security, healthcare and technology use adoption.
Promote and produce 'Made in Rwanda' products for the export economy.
Offer professional and consultancy services that promote research, learning and translation.
Establish collaborations and networks with relevant government agencies and organizations sharing similar aspirations and goals.
The Institute
Our Research and
Training Divisions
The Institute is composed of these Seven (7) Multidisciplinary Research and Training Divisions, dedicated to generating evidence that informs Africa’s development.
Life Science and Humanity (LSH)
Advancing health research while preserving human values and ethical frameworks across Africa.
Water, Food and Agriculture (WFA)
Driving sustainable agricultural practices and water management for regional food security.
Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM)
Fostering technical innovation and infrastructure engineering for the next generation.
Social and Management Sciences (SMS)
Analyzing societal dynamics and management structures to optimize development outcomes.
Environment, Earth and Space (EES)
Exploring planetary health and space science to protect our natural ecosystem.
Training, Education and Development (TED)
Empowering professionals through high-level capacity building and skill development.
Research, Management, Innovation and Translation (ReMIT)
The core engine for translating research findings into real-world sustainable solutions.
Work Process
How We Deliver
Sustainable Impact
Research Design and Planning
We create innovative research frameworks to address Africa’s most pressing challenges.
Resource Mobilization and Collaboration
We source expertise, funding, and partnerships to drive impactful research initiatives.
Testing and Validation
We ensure the highest quality and reliability of research outcomes through rigorous testing.
Implementation and Impact Translation
We translate research findings into real-world solutions for sustainable development.
Upcoming Events
Join Our Community
Participate in groundbreaking research events, workshops, and webinars shaping Africa's future.
Growing a Preclinical Platform: Lessons from the Ground Up
Speaker: Prof. Rose Hayeshi, PhD
Build expertise with certified online courses
Applied skills for Africa's workforce — bridging knowledge and practice
Digital Innovation & Cybersecurity
This school serves the learner who is not a software engineer but needs to operate competently in a digital economy — the entrepreneur building an online business, the professional managing digital risk, the small business owner adopting digital tools, the marketer running digital campaigns. Africa's digital economy is projected to reach $180 billion. Cybersecurity is a top priority for banking, telecom, and enterprise sectors. Digital marketing, e-commerce, and digital business operations are among the most demanded skills across the continent. Yet most available training is either too technical (certified ethical hacking for engineers) or too superficial (one-hour social media tutorials). This school provides structured, applied, middle-ground education that fills that gap.
General Academy & Orientation
Orientations, platform guidelines, CPD policy frameworks, and core professional development modules open to all members.
Health Systems & Cold Chain Science
This school serves health professionals, supply chain managers, and public health practitioners with applied skills that strengthen health systems, improve logistics, and advance community health outcomes. Africa faces critical health system vulnerabilities: cold chain gaps that compromise vaccine efficacy, shortages of trained health logistics professionals, fragmented public health governance, and a need for continuous professional development for health workers who cannot leave their posts for extended training. This school addresses those gaps head-on. Programs are built on applied health system practice — not theoretical public health but real-world health system strengthening. The cold chain track is a distinctive specialization rarely offered by other online academies, creating a natural bridge to the agriculture school's cold chain for food systems.
Leadership, Governance & Public Policy
This school serves the public sector, civil society, and institutional leadership audience. It addresses the demand for applied leadership and governance skills that research consistently identifies as critical for Africa's workforce: adaptability, analytical thinking, leadership in hybrid environments, public sector management, and policy translation. This school is not a public administration department. It is a practical leadership school that equips people to lead institutions, govern effectively, formulate evidence-based policy, and manage complex multi-stakeholder initiatives. The policy track creates a direct pipeline from the Research Methodology school — researchers learn to translate evidence, and policymakers learn to consume it. The leadership track focuses on practical leadership capabilities, not management theory.
Research Methodology & Translation
This school serves researchers, academics, and institutions that need to design better studies, analyze data correctly, secure funding, publish effectively, and — critically — translate research findings into policy and practice. It addresses a gap that conventional universities often miss: the applied craft of research. Not theory of science, but how to actually write a grant that gets funded, design a study that passes ethics review, use statistical software correctly, and turn findings into policy briefs that decision-makers actually read. Africa's research output is growing, but gaps persist in study design, statistical analysis, grant writing, publication strategy, and research-to-policy translation. Many researchers learn these skills by trial and error. This school provides structured, applied research capacity building at continental scale.
School of Applied Artificial Intelligence & Data Science
This school does not teach Python syntax or neural network architecture. It teaches professionals how to think with AI, direct AI effectively, and deploy AI tools in real work contexts. The school's philosophy is that in the age of AI, the scarce skill is not knowing how transformers work but knowing how to deploy AI tools effectively in your specific professional context. A nurse learning to use AI for patient data analysis. A marketer using AI for campaign optimization. A policy analyst using data dashboards for decision-making. An entrepreneur building agentic AI workflows for business automation. These are the learners this school serves. The assessment is not "can you code a model" but "can you use AI to solve this problem.
FIRAT Offers USD 200,000 SnapGenius Research Facility to Boost Research Excellence in African Universities
The Foresight Institute of Research and Translation (FIRAT) announces a major continental research infrastructure support initiative valued at approximately USD 200,000, aimed at strengthening research productivity across 17 African universities.
SnapGenius: The Ultimate Research Workspace for Students
Struggling with your thesis or dissertation analysis? SnapGenius brings survey design, data analysis, and writing into one seamless workspace.
12th EDCTP Forum: Rwanda Hosts Premier Global Health Research Partnership Conference
The 12th EDCTP Forum brings together over 1,200 global health researchers in Kigali, marking Rwanda's emergence as a leading hub for health research partnerships.
FIRAT Rwanda Leads Global Effort to Establish Public Health Pharmacology
FIRAT Rwanda announces the publication of a landmark article in Discover Medicine establishing Public Health Pharmacology as a distinct discipline.
Division Dispatch
Latest from Each Division
Explore groundbreaking research and editorial coverage across all FIRAT divisions — from life sciences to space exploration.
Updates & Announcements
More Updates →
Diplomatic Vanguard on the Plastic Frontier: How the African Group of Negotiators and Rwanda Anchored Upstream Production Caps and Waste-Picker Equity in the Global Plastics Treaty
Across high-stakes sessions of the UN Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5 / INC-5.2), the African Group of Negotiators (AGN) and the High Ambition Coalition co-chaired by Rwanda forged a unified diplomatic front—securing binding treaty provisions for primary plastic polymer reduction targets, the phase-out of 16,000+ toxic chemical additives, a dedicated Multilateral Fund, and the formal inclusion of informal waste pickers.
Closing the Lawless Ocean Frontier: How African Diplomacy and the 60-Nation Ratification Threshold Brought the UN High Seas Treaty into Force
Entering into force following the 60-nation ratification milestone, the UN High Seas Treaty (BBNJ Agreement) establishes binding international governance across 64% of the global ocean surface, operationalizing African-championed provisions on Digital Sequence Information benefit-sharing, mandatory Environmental Impact Assessments, and high seas Marine Protected Areas aligned with the Nairobi and Abidjan Conventions.
Global Biodiversity Framework Fund Deploys Initial Multilateral Capital to High-Priority African Mega-Biodiversity Corridors
Operationalizing decisions under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the Global Environment Facility's GBFF Council has approved pivotal capital tranches directing conservation and bio-economy resources to the Congo Basin, Madagascar's marine ecosystems, and the Guinean Forests of West Africa, surpassing international targets for Indigenous and local community resource allocation.
WHO and Africa CDC Allocate 70,000 Ebola Vaccine Doses to DRC Amid Bundibugyo Virus Outbreak
The International Coordinating Group on Vaccine Provision has released 70,000 doses of Ervebo vaccine to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, including 20,000 for a Phase 3 clinical trial testing the vaccine's efficacy against the Bundibugyo virus — a species of ebolavirus for which no licensed vaccine yet exists.
Latest Research & Webinars
Stay updated with our most recent scientific sessions and research findings.
Opportunities Hidden in Africa’s Agricultural Crisis
Why Gender Equality and Youth Inclusion Matter in Modern Farming
How Technology Is Transforming Modern Agriculture
How Agriculture Drives Agenda 2063 & National Development Goals
Building Profitable Agri Value Chains for Sustainable Growth
How Local Governance Can Transform Farming Systems
Month 6 | Reporting and Presenting Research Findings
Month 5 | Inferential Statistics and Hypothesis Testing
Month 4 | Descriptive Statistics & Data Visualization
Month 3 | Data Collection, Measurement & Sample Size Determination
Month 1 | Introduction to Research Methodology and Biostatistics
Month 2 | Study Design and Sampling Methods Explained
SnapGenius Launch Event: The New Era of Research | Built by FIRAT
How Drosophila Research Drives Drug Discovery | Prof. Ruben Artero
Beyond CRISPR: The Search & Replace Tool Editing Life Itself
What if Our Best Defense Was Hidden Inside Ancient Bacteria? (The CRISPR Story)
My Vaccine Research Story
The Ageing of a Stem Cell Niche: Surprising Discoveries & Common Themes
Outsmarting Our Own DNA
The Molecular Scissors Cas9 Mechanism
How CRISPR Actually Works: Rewriting the Code of Human Life
What is Cyberspace? A Beginner's Guide to the Digital World
Mechanisms of blood glucose regulation during murine Trypanosomiasis
From PhD Research to Clinical Biochemist: A Scientist’s Career Path
The Nurses’ Diary | A Day with the Nurses
How to Find and Clean Your Digital Footprint
Ep2 | Early Years, Big Impact - Managing Child Health Risks
Insights into infectious diseases immunomodulation
Drosophila and Organoids as a Model System in Biomedicine
Cats Can Get Alzheimer’s?! (Latest Scientific Breakthroughs)
Drosophila melanogaster: Solution for Research in Low Resource Settings
Ep1 | Safe Births, Stronger Futures: Reimagining Maternal Health
Influenza A Virus in Africa | Genome & Therapy Insights
Ep3 | Preconception Care
How to Spot Online Scams & Threats Before You Click
Mental Health is a Human Right: Bridging the Gap in LMICs
The Nurses’ Diary | Burnout and Mental Health
Ep4 | Scaling Up Antenatal Services in LMICs
The Truth About Your Teeth: Top Myths Debunked by Experts
The Nurses’ Diary | Episode 3
Tiny Flies, Big Impact: Drosophila melanogaster in Toxicological Research
The Importance of Oral Hygiene: Expert Tips for a Healthy Smile
Building Research Capacity in Nigeria: Drosophila Insights
From Flies to Mice: Understanding Diabetes & Parkinson's Disease
Top Cybersecurity Tools for Everyday Protection
Create Your Personal Online Safety Plan
Bridging Research and Community Solutions in Mental Health
The Role of Fundamental Research in Driving Innovation in Africa
The Nurses’ Diary | Global Nursing Voices Launch
Discovering Disease Insights: Drosophila in Biomedical Research
The Psychology of a Hacker: Understanding Cybercrime to Stay Safe
Genomic Insights into Marburg Virus in Rwanda
Why Microbes Are Winning & The Role of Fundamental Research!
Ep5 | Bridging the Gap: Elevating Mothers’ Voices
Precision medicine: Drosophila for personalised cancer treatment
Opportunities Hidden in Africa’s Agricultural Crisis
Why Gender Equality and Youth Inclusion Matter in Modern Farming
How Technology Is Transforming Modern Agriculture
How Agriculture Drives Agenda 2063 & National Development Goals
Building Profitable Agri Value Chains for Sustainable Growth
How Local Governance Can Transform Farming Systems
Month 6 | Reporting and Presenting Research Findings
Month 5 | Inferential Statistics and Hypothesis Testing
Month 4 | Descriptive Statistics & Data Visualization
Month 3 | Data Collection, Measurement & Sample Size Determination
Month 1 | Introduction to Research Methodology and Biostatistics
Month 2 | Study Design and Sampling Methods Explained
SnapGenius Launch Event: The New Era of Research | Built by FIRAT
How Drosophila Research Drives Drug Discovery | Prof. Ruben Artero
Beyond CRISPR: The Search & Replace Tool Editing Life Itself
What if Our Best Defense Was Hidden Inside Ancient Bacteria? (The CRISPR Story)
My Vaccine Research Story
The Ageing of a Stem Cell Niche: Surprising Discoveries & Common Themes
Outsmarting Our Own DNA
The Molecular Scissors Cas9 Mechanism
How CRISPR Actually Works: Rewriting the Code of Human Life
What is Cyberspace? A Beginner's Guide to the Digital World
Mechanisms of blood glucose regulation during murine Trypanosomiasis
From PhD Research to Clinical Biochemist: A Scientist’s Career Path
The Nurses’ Diary | A Day with the Nurses
How to Find and Clean Your Digital Footprint
Ep2 | Early Years, Big Impact - Managing Child Health Risks
Insights into infectious diseases immunomodulation
Drosophila and Organoids as a Model System in Biomedicine
Cats Can Get Alzheimer’s?! (Latest Scientific Breakthroughs)
Drosophila melanogaster: Solution for Research in Low Resource Settings
Ep1 | Safe Births, Stronger Futures: Reimagining Maternal Health
Influenza A Virus in Africa | Genome & Therapy Insights
Ep3 | Preconception Care
How to Spot Online Scams & Threats Before You Click
Mental Health is a Human Right: Bridging the Gap in LMICs
The Nurses’ Diary | Burnout and Mental Health
Ep4 | Scaling Up Antenatal Services in LMICs
The Truth About Your Teeth: Top Myths Debunked by Experts
The Nurses’ Diary | Episode 3
Tiny Flies, Big Impact: Drosophila melanogaster in Toxicological Research
The Importance of Oral Hygiene: Expert Tips for a Healthy Smile
Building Research Capacity in Nigeria: Drosophila Insights
From Flies to Mice: Understanding Diabetes & Parkinson's Disease
Top Cybersecurity Tools for Everyday Protection
Create Your Personal Online Safety Plan
Bridging Research and Community Solutions in Mental Health
The Role of Fundamental Research in Driving Innovation in Africa
The Nurses’ Diary | Global Nursing Voices Launch
Discovering Disease Insights: Drosophila in Biomedical Research
The Psychology of a Hacker: Understanding Cybercrime to Stay Safe
Genomic Insights into Marburg Virus in Rwanda
Why Microbes Are Winning & The Role of Fundamental Research!
Ep5 | Bridging the Gap: Elevating Mothers’ Voices
Precision medicine: Drosophila for personalised cancer treatment
FIRAT Innovations
SnapGenius
The Operating System for the Research Lifecycle — professional tools for building intelligent forms, analyzing complex datasets, and generating publication-ready documents.
ScholarBits
Free, no-sign-up micro-tools for researchers. 142+ focused tools, 51 AI-powered, built to solve one task fast with privacy-first browser workflows.
Our Ecosystem
Global Partners & Collaborators
Have any Question?
We're here to help!
Reach out to us for inquiries, collaborations, or support. Our team typically responds within 24 hours.
Office Address
93, KK 31 Avenue, Gikondo- Kigali, Rwanda
Email Address
support@firat.rw
Phone Number
+250 798 284 100