The Regional VLBI Workshop is one of four international workshops that will be held throughout 2019 to build partnerships between several projects in development through radio astronomy that have already been established via the Newton Fund in Africa, Latin America and South East Asia. This collaboration will form a global network of expertise in the mobilization of radio astronomy for economic development. The network will establish and build 'south-south' connections that will help the sharing of experiences and lessons learned in how to translate the high tech skills of radio astronomy into local job creation and entrepreneurship. Other low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) in the three continental regions not currently involved will be encouraged to join the established activities and build strong regional collaborations around this theme.

This workshop will bring together science and organisational experts in the field of VLBI to explore how it can be used as a vehicle to build strong regional scientific collaborations amongst developing countries. Participants will be invited from developing countries that are interested in joining regional VLBI networks using existing, converted or new-build dishes. Participants from Latin America, Africa and SE Asia will be invited to discuss the potential of establishing or extending VLBI networks in their respective regions. The workshop will discuss the kind of radio astronomy and geodesy that such regional VLBI networks can carry out and how the development of such a collaboration in radio astronomy could lead to cooperation in related engineering and industrial sectors to drive economic development at the regional level.

This event is hosted by the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) and co-organized by UK institutions including the University of Leeds, the University of Hertfordshire, and the University of South Wales.