Visit to ULiège by the Ambassador of France

François Sénémaud, Ambassador of France, visited the University of Liège on 25 January and met Rector Pierre Wolper. The meeting was an opportunity to underline the strength of the links that historically unite our university with many partners in France.

More than 2,000 students of French nationality are enrolled each year at ULiège, i.e. 8% of our student population. Some courses (with a quota for non-residents) in the Faculties of Veterinary Medicine and Medicine are particularly attractive to French students, a situation which the Ambassador is well aware of.

France is also one of ULiège's major partners for student mobility programmes. There are currently 307 mobility agreements with 138 French institutions, which means that this academic year 171 French students will be coming to our university (for 87 ULiège students going to France). The desire expressed at the meeting is to move towards a balance in these exchanges.

Through the co-diploma programmes, strong structural collaborations have been established between ULiège and French universities, of which there are currently 28. There are many co-supervision agreements for PhD theses, 58 to date and in all 11 Faculties.

At the Euregional level, Rector Pierre Wolper recalled our partnership with the University of Lorraine within the UniGR. ULiège also collaborates with the University of Lille within Wallonia-France through the cross-border research unit for sustainable agriculture of Prof. Philippe Jacques at Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech, a project in which the University of Picardie Jules Verne (UPJV) and INRAE are also participating.

In the framework of the French Presidency of the Council of the EU, the Ambassador expressed France's interest in collaborations in the fields of sustainable energy and sustainable agriculture.