•  In 2008 the EU commissioned a connectivity study on the interconnection of regional African research networks to the EU’s GEANT R&D network.
• The Book of Lighthouse Projects is published describing 19 priority projects for Africa – 12 in science, 5 in Information Society and 2 in Space – marked for short to medium term implementation. Six of these are designated for early delivery: Africa Connect, African Internet Exchange System, Popularisation of S&T, African Research Grants, Water and Food Security in Africa and the African Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES-Africa).
• In collaboration with UNESCO the African Virtual Campus project, whose initial phase was partly Spanish funded, is being implemented and national virtual campuses established in 11 countries.
• The HIPSSA project (harmonization of ICT polices in sub-Saharan Africa) is aligned with the partnership objectives through the direct involvement of the AUC and the RECs.
• In July 2009, the EU’s 7th Research Framework Programme launched a call for proposals dedicated to Africa. The call – worth €63 million – covers research activities focusing on water and food security, and on better health for Africa. Special rules were adopted to encourage the maximum participation of African researchers for whom €53 million of funding support is earmarked in the call budget.
• African Research Grants are funded with €15 million drawn from the Science and Technology allocation of the 10th EDF, intra-ACP indicative programme.
• The African Union capacity building programme funds the first year of the project ‘Popularisation of Science and Technology and Promotion of Public Participation’. The first continent-wide African Women and Young Scientist Awards are made on African Union Day, 9 September 2009 and the Continental Scientist Award was presented at the African Union Summit in January 2010..
• In 2009, an important ICT project was funded under the 10th EDF Intra-ACP indicative programme: Africa Connect (€11.8 m) will look at the strategic and technical aspects for consolidating the emerging National Research and Education Networks (NRENs) and integrating them both regionally and internationally. It will also look at connecting the regional networks to the European GEANT backbone - the world's largest multi-gigabit computer network dedicated to research and education. The objective is to contribute to bridging both digital and scientific divides in Africa, providing the African scientific community with better access to research and education resources and peers around the globe through broadband capacity on affordable terms.
   

Another important project was funded by the Infrastructure Trust Fund in September 2010: the African Internet Exchange System (AXIS) (€3 million) aims to support the establishment of a continental African internet infrastructure through local and regional internet exchange points (IXPs). Such deployment is considered crucial for the development of the internet in Africa, generating huge costs savings by keeping local traffic local and offering better quality of service and new applications opportunities.
 

• An exploratory document prepared by European and African experts in 2009 forms the basis for consultation on the proposed GMES and Africa Action Plan. DG Enterprise, under the Framework Programme 7-Space, has allocated €3 million for research projects to support GMES in Africa. Another € 20 million are available under the 10th EDF Intra-ACP Programme for this initiative.
• Under the Capacities programme of FP7 two large actions of over €3 million each (over four years) have been launched to support the S&T dialogue and create cooperation platforms with sub-Saharan African countries (CAAST-net) and Mediterranean partner countries (MIRA). They both aim to identify common areas of research interest, set up S&T priorities and support capacity building.