The COSPAR Capacity Building Initiative and its associated Fellowship Programme

The COSPAR Capacity Building Workshops have been conceived to meet the following objec-tives: i) to increase knowledge and use of public archives of space data in order both to broaden the scope of research programmes in developing countries and also to ensure that scientists in those countries are aware of the full range of facilities that are available to them, ii) to provide highly-practical instruction in the use of these archives and the associated publicly-available software, and iii) to foster personal links between participants and experienced scientists at-tending the workshops to contribute to reducing the isolation often experienced by scientists in developing countries. Since 2001 a total of eleven workshops have been successfully held in different scientific areas (X-ray, Gamma-ray and Space Optical and UV Astronomy, Mag-netospheric Physics, Space Oceanography and Planetary Science) in nine developing countries (Brazil, India, China, South Africa, Morocco, Romania, Uruguay, Egypt and Malaysia). To enable young scientists who have participated in a Workshop to build on skills gained there, the COSPAR Panel for Capacity-Building has initiated in 2008 an associated Fellowship Programme. A total number of 14 institutes from several european countries, USA, China and India are participating in the programme offering those to carry out a 2-4 week research project together with a resident scientist. We will discuss the modalities of the workshops, the so-far gained experience, and the future including collaborations with other institutions sharing the aim of increasing the scientific activities in developing countries.