Please accept our apologies for multiple postings
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     Operational Research Practice in Africa (ORPA) series
First ORPA conference, 7-8 April 2005, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso

A UNIQUE forum for a UNIQUE continent with UNIQUE challenges
and UNIQUE opportunities


             Call For Participation
             Call For Contributions
             Call For Sponsorship
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DESCRIPTION
ORPA is the Premier conference on OR Practice in Africa. ORPA-1 is the
first in a series of Operational Research Practice in Africa (ORPA)
conferences bringing together OR practitioners, OR academics, and
potential OR users from industry, government and NGO's operating in
Africa. ORPA-1 will feature the largest concentration of industry
experts, OR professionals, OR academics, top decision makers from key
organisations in Africa ever brought together in one place for two days
that promise to be very enriching. We guarantee that nowhere else in the
continent will you have this UNIQUE opportunity.
ORPA-1 is organised in collaboration with EURO (European Association of
Operational Research Societies), IFORS (International Federation of
Operational Research Societies) and INFORMS (Institute for Operations
Research and the Management Sciences), the three largest Operational
Research organisations in the world.

CONFERENCE WEB SITE http://www.euro-online.org/africanOR/orpa2005

THEME of ORPA-1: OR for the development of Africa

PROGRAMME
ORPA-1 will feature a number of events including an OR Exhibit, Plenary
talks, Keynote Presentations, Study Groups, Special Sessions and Tutorials.

CALL FOR PAPERS (ORDINARY CONTRIBUTIONS)
Abstracts and papers are being solicited to feature at ORPA-1. We are
particularly interested in applications of Operational Research in
developing countries, although other real-world applications of
Operational Research in more developed countries are also welcome.
Please refer to the web site for details / instructions on submitting a
paper or an abstract. Papers will be reviewed by the Programme Committee.

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION IN OR EXHIBIT
Companies and other organisations (NGO's, government agencies, United
Nations agencies, etc.) using Operational Research / Management Science
(OR/MS) are invited to participate to the ORPA-1 OR Exhibit. This OR
Exhibit will feature both local companies as well as multinational firms
operating in developing countries. The OR Exhibit is a great opportunity
to "network" and showcase your organisation to the OR public in Africa.
If you would like to participate in this OR Exhibit please contact the
programme committee co-chairs (see web site).

CALL FOR TUTORIAL PROPOSALS
If you would like to present a tutorial at ORPA-1, please send a
(1-2)-page (A4) description of the proposed tutorial to the programme
committee co-chairs (see web site). The proposal should describe the
following: chosen subject and why it might be of interest to ORPA-1,
target audience, pre-requisite, content and aims of the proposed
tutorial, learning outcomes.

CALL FOR SPECIAL SESSION PROPOSALS
If you would like to organise a special session at ORPA-1, please send a
1-page (A4) proposal to the programme committee co-chairs (see web
site). The proposal should contain the title of the chosen topic and
should explain clearly why this topic might be of interest to ORPA.
Please be specific in the topic of your proposal.

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION IN STUDY GROUPS
Study groups will bring together decision makers who work for various
public and private organisations. Each member of the group (subject to
time constraints) will be invited to describe operational problems
encountered in their business processes and the group will try to
suggest a number of possible OR/MS approaches that might be employed to
solve the specific problems described. To help achieve this, each study
group will be assigned a Facilitator. The Facilitator is an OR
specialist with considerable experience in OR and thus will be able to
suggest possible OR approaches for each problem exposed by the group.
The point here is to make members of the group realise what OR can do
for their business.
If you would like to take part in one of the ORPA-1 Study Groups please
tick the "Study Group" box on the registration form. The form will be
made available in the registration section of the ORPA 2005 web site.


CALL FOR KEYNOTE PRESENTERS (ORPA AMBASSADORS)
ORPA-1 will feature a number of keynote presentations. Unlike ordinary
contributions, here we are looking for "briliant" speakers who are able
to explain CLEARLY and CONSISTENTLY to our non-OR audience what OR is
and how it was used in their chosen real-world case study. Furthermore
keynote presenters will be considered for an appointment as an "ORPA
Ambassador" and, in that capacity, will be asked to chair (i.e act as a
Facilator in) a Study Group at ORPA-1 (see previous paragraph). For this
reason, we are particularly interested in hearing from OR experts with
an ability to communicate well in both English and French, although
people who can communicate very well in only one of these two languages
are also encouraged to submit their proposal. ORPA Ambassadors will also
be given a "certificate of acknowledgement" and may be asked in that
capacity to be involved in future OR Practice publicity and other
promotional events across Africa and even beyond.
If you would like to suggest the name of an OR expert who, in your
opinion, should be invited to present an application of OR under this
category (and hence be considered for an ORPA Ambassadorship), please
contact the programme committee co-chairs. Equally, if you would like to
submit a paper under this category, please send a (2-3)-page description
of your proposal with the following details:name, affiliation and
address of author, expertise area and length of expertise (i.e how much
experience), proposed subject, pre-requisite for target audience,
content of presentation, presentation outcomes. Please also provide a
telephone number where you can be contacted and the name, telephone
number and email address of 2 referees as we may require to conduct an
interview and / or verify your claims through your referees.


PLENARY SPEAKERS
ORPA-1 is proud to feature the following plenary speakers.

- IFORS Plenary speaker: Prof Theo Stewart, IFORS Vice President
(Developing Countries)
- EURO Plenary speaker: Prof Alexis Tsoukias, President of EURO
- INFORMS Plenary speaker: (speaker yet to be announced)


POST CONFERENCE BOOK
After the conference, authors of a few select papers presented at ORPA-1
will be given the opportunity to submit a revised and enhanced version
of their work. The best papers will then be selected for publication in
an OR textbook (being negociated). The theme of the OR textbook is
Applications of OR for development. The co-editors of the OR textbook
will be Eric Soubeiga, Serigne Gueye, Blaise Some, Alexis Tsoukias and
Claude G. Yugma. The textbook will illustrate real-world applications of
OR to tackle developmental issues. It is intended for OR teachers and
undergraduate students taking an OR course as well as OR practitioners
in industry in the developing world. One of the main aims of the book is
to demonstrate the relevance of OR in the developing world. Our
experience in working in OR projects in Africa suggests that many non-OR
people perceive (and dismiss) the discipline as being of use only in the
developed world, in a high-tech environment, etc. As OR educators we
ought to correct this erroneous view.



ORPA 2005 GENERAL CHAIR
Eric Soubeiga, University of Nottingham, UK

ORPA 2005 PROGRAMME COMMITTEE
Eric Soubeiga (General Chair), University of Nottingham (UK)
Serigne Gueye (co-Chair), University of Havre (France)
Claude G. Yugma (co-Chair), Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble
(France)
Moncef Abbas, H B University of Sci & Tech (Algeria)
Habib Chabchoub, Faculty of Economics and management, Sfax (Tunisia)
Alistair Clark, University of the West of England (UK)
Gordon Dash, University of Rhode Island (USA)
Patrick De Causmaecker, KaHo St.-Lieven (Belgium)
Laure Pauline Fotso, University of Yaounde 1 (Cameroon)
Jens Gottlieb, SAP AG (Germany)
Hans Ittmann, CSIR (South Africa)
Graham Kendall, University of Nottingham (UK)
Ralf Keuthen, PA Consulting (UK)
Dario Landa-Silva, University of Nottingham (UK)
Irv Lustig, ILOG (USA)
Abdelatif Mansouri, University Cadi Ayyad Marrakech, (Marocco)
Subhash Narula, Virginia Commonwealth University (USA)
Ibrahim Osman, American University of Beirut (Lebanon)
Celso Ribeiro, Pontificia Universidade Catolica do Rio de Janieiro (Brazil)
Andrea Schaerf, University of Udine (Italy)
Marc Sevaux, University of Valenciennes (France)
David Smith, University of Exeter (UK)
Blaise Some, University of Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso)
Kenneth Sorensen, University of Antwerp (Belgium)
Theo Stewart, University of Cape Town (South Africa)
El-Ghazali Talbi, University of Lille (France)
Jacques Teghem, Faculte Polytechnique de Mons (Belgium)
Berthold Ulungu, Faculte Polytechnique de Mons (Belgium)
Chris Voudouris, British Telecom (UK)


ORPA 2005 LOCAL ORGANISING COMMITTEE
Eric Soubeiga (co-Chair), University of Nottingham, (UK)
Blaise Some (co-Chair), University of Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso)
M. Abouba (BF)
O. B. Konfe (BF)
A. Metchebon (BF)
A. Ouedraogo (BF)
O. So (BF)
H. L. Some (BF)
E. B. Thiombiano (BF)
E. Traore (BF)
B. Ulungu (BEL)
J. W. Yougbare (BF)
c. g. Yugma (FRA)

ORPA SERIES INTERNATIONAL STEERING COMMITTEE
Eric Soubeiga (Chair), University of Nottingham (UK)
James C. Bean, University of Oregon (USA)
Edmund K. Burke, University of Nottingham (UK)
Michel Gendreau, University of Montreal (Canada)
Jonathan Rosenhead, London School of Economics and Political Science (UK)
Blaise Some, University of Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso)
Theo Stewart, University of Cape Town (South Africa)
Jacques Teghem, Faculte Polytechnique de Mons (Belgium)
Michael Trick, Carnegie Mellon University (USA)
Arabinda Tripathy, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (India)
Alexis Tsoukias, Universite Paris Dauphine (France)



IMPORTANT DATES
Deadline for submission of contributions (ordinary submissions, keynote
presentations, tutorials, special sessions): 15 December 2004
Notification of acceptance: 17 January 2005
Deadline for submission of OR Exhibit proposals: 15 January 2005
Conference: 07-08 April 2005


For all enquiries please visit the website
(http://www.euro-online.org/africanOR/orpa2005) or contact any member of
the organising committee

ORPA 2005 ORGANISING COMMITTEE
Eric Soubeiga, [log in to unmask]
Blaise Some, [log in to unmask]
Serigne Gueye, [log in to unmask]
Claude G. Yugma, [log in to unmask]


--
Dr E Soubeiga
Research Fellow, Hall Warden, Industrial Consultant
School of Computer Science & IT
The University of Nottingham
Jubilee Campus, Wollaton Road
Nottingham NG8 1BB
Tel: +44 (0)115 846 6531
Fax: +44 (0)115 951 4254
Email: [log in to unmask]
[log in to unmask]

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