ADAPTED fellow and former IEE research fellow and PhD IDS student Akua Martinson has successfully defended her PhD thesis titled "Essays on Job Creation and Poverty Reduction in Africa" on June, 17, 2026. She has been awarded a joint degree of a Philosophiae Doctor (Ph.D.) from Ruhr-University Bochum and the University Paris 1 Sorbonne.

The defence took place at the Institute of Development Research and Development Policy (IEE) at Ruhr-University Bochum and the examination committee consisted of the two supervisors Prof. Wilhelm Löwenstein and Prof. Rémi Bazillier as well as Prof. Anthony Black (University of Cape Town), Prof. Jann Lay (German Institute for Global and Area Studies, GIGA), and Prof. Célestin Monga (Harvard Kennedy School). Akua's PhD research was part of the EU-funded joint doctoral network ADAPTED, that was coordinated by the IEE, and Akua's thesis contributes to the work package "analysing interactions between poverty reduction and other policy areas."