Biodiversity conference
The workshop was facilitated by Dr. Steve Lancaster, an analytical scientist and a senior technologist within the petrochemical industry (BP) and Professor Antony Gachanjah, an associate professor in analytical/environmental chemistry at JKUAT. In attendance were about 25 participants drawn from 7 sub-Saharan African countries namely: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Ghana. Out of these, 11 were sponsored by PACN Kenya and 3 by OPCW.
The workshop was opened on the 2nd March, 2009 at the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) with the Vice Chancellor Professor Mabel Imbuga, the Deputy Vice Chancellors, the Dean, Faculty of Science and lecturers from the Department of Chemistry gracing the occasion. The Vice Chancellor who officially opened the workshop noted that JKUAT had made great strides in the use of GC-MS equipment, notably in the analysis of pharmaceutical products, pesticide residues in water from coffee growing areas and examination of pyrethrum extracts among others. She called on
PAN AFRICA CHEMISTRY NETWORK
scientists to employ modern technology to check the proliferation of counterfeit pharmaceutical products in Kenya which accounts for 30% of all drugs in the Kenyan market.
Among the topics covered in the workshop were; introduction to the GC and MS, interpretation of spectra, maintenance of the GC-MS, tuning and calibration of GC-MS, running of the GC-MS, sample pre-treatment using solid phase extraction method and identification of unknowns in an analgesic drug sample. All the participants appreciated the opportunity accorded to them through the sponsorship from PACN Kenya and OPCW to train in the workshop. They reckoned that that the workshop was timely, the content was high class and that their expectations were largely met despite the short workshop duration. One of the participants thus remarked, "There is need for collaboration of scientists in Africa and this workshop has opened an opportunity for us to form USA - United Scientists of Africa."
Dr. Steve Lancaster, one of the facilitators remarked that in the next five (5) years, we will see world class analytical scientists coming from Africa and hence this team should go out and disseminate what they have learnt.
After a week of intensive training, the workshop was finally closed down on the 6th March, 2009 by the Dean of the Faculty of Science, Professor David Mulati who in his closing remarks thanked PACN Kenya for organizing the workshop in their institution and OPCW for sponsoring some of the participants. He said that this international workshop has put the Department of Chemistry and the entire institution in the limelight and that they are ready to host another instrumentation workshop which OPCW has offered to sponsor.
