With the support of Camões IP, the Centre for International Studies of Iscte - University Institute of Lisbon and the School of Education and Social Sciences of the Polytechnic Institute of Leiria are holding a project on: The Profile of PALOP Students at HEIs in Portugal: characterisation, expectations, difficulties. The aim is to continue reflecting on education co-operation between African countries and other countries in the light of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), specifically SDG 4 and SDG 8. Over the past decade, there has been a notable surge in the presence of students from PALOP countries within the Portuguese university system. Thanks to agreements forged between the Portuguese government and the governments of Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, and São Tomé and Príncipe, students from these nations can pursue higher education through dedicated slots for international students, with tuition fees on par with those applicable to domestic students and those from the European university area. Despite the evident growth in the number of students hailing from these regions, the available studies on this demographic are sparse and predominantly monographic. It is crucial to attain a more comprehensive understanding of this evolving landscape, wherein Portugal aligns itself with the SDGs, particularly SDG 4 and SDG 8, thereby facilitating the advanced education and training of these students.

This project analyses the intersection of human rights and gender in two west African countries, Guinea Bissau and Senegal, by looking into the local resistances to sexual and reproductive rights. Through a consideration of the evolving cultural practices relative to sexuality, and the ideological refashioning of society, we consider activisms for gender equality, against gender based violence and promotion of rights to sexuality, we focus on how society engages with body politics. While there has been a multiplication of studies, in the last decades, around the way the social is produced through the regulation of sexuality, most studies present a fairly schematic conceptualisation of normativity. This project builds upon a previous knowledge on sociocultural dynamics and cultural values to consider the obstacles to the social change coded in the promotion of sexual and reproductive rights.