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African challenge: why old approaches no longer work? As part of the situational analysis "Practice of Russian humanitarian policy in sub-Saharan Africa", organized by the A.M. Gorchakov Public Diplomacy Support Fund, experts from various industries outlined promising areas of Russian work in the humanitarian sphere on the African continent. Member of the board of the AREA, director of IBAC Yulia Berg in her report emphasized the need to update approaches to promoting Russian business. "Of course, the Soviet experience remains an important reference, but it is time to look forward. The world has changed: now we have the Internet, instant information exchange, and this creates a completely different reality in which PR and work with the media cannot be ignored," Berg said. In turn, the executive secretary of the AREA and founder of the consulting agency GR-group Andrey Gromov emphasized the key role of education in humanitarian cooperation. He recalled that about a third of energy company executives and representatives of relevant energy bodies in many African countries are graduates of various Soviet universities. At the same time, the expert criticized the current approach, pointing out that "hanging" the entire burden on the state, as was the case in the USSR, is ineffective. "We are trying to do everything the same way as before in the Soviet Union - centrally, vertically, through scientific and educational institutions. But this no longer works. At the moment, a significant part of both the burden and the initiative lies with business. This also applies to energy companies," Gromov noted. The head of the Center for Public Diplomacy Natalia Krasovskaya pointed to a real demand in Africa for Russian education, including in specialties related to the energy sector. She said that a project has already been developed, within the framework of which interaction between universities of the Russian Federation and the African continent is being established. At the same time, Artem Kozvonin, Head of the Department of Economic and Humanitarian Cooperation of the Department of Partnership with Africa of the Russian Foreign Ministry, added that the department is widely considering humanitarian policy. The main driver and calling card is education. Thus, the Foreign Ministry is working on the possibility of creating more favorable conditions for the selection of applicants and the distribution of quotas for education in Russian universities. #AREA#Africa#Russia#energy