The L’Oréal Foundation and UNESCO have been working together for the past 14 years to bring the work of exceptional women scientists visibility and support. Every year within the L’Oréal-UNESCO Programme for Women in Science, five laureates receive a prestigious award and 15 international fellows are designated, three from each continent. Since 2011, a Special Fellow ‘in the footsteps of Marie Curie’ is also designated each year to commemorate the centenary of the award of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry to Marie Curie in 1911. The Special Fellow is chosen from among previous International Fellows.

The laureates from Africa since 2003 have been: Karimate El-Sayed (Egypt, 2003), Jennifer Thomson, (South Africa, 2004), Zohra Ben Lakhdar (Tunisia, 2005), Habiba Bouhamed Chaabouni (Tunisia, 2006), Ameenah Gurib-Fakim (Mauritius, 2007), Tebello Nyokong (South Africa, 2009), Rashika El Ridi (Egypt, 2010), Jill Farrant (South Africa, 2012) and Francisca Nneka Okeke (Nigeria, 2013).

Professors Ben Ladhdar and Gurib-Fakim both participated in the First Africa Forum on STI for Youth Employment, Human Capital Development and Inclusive Growth (Nairobi, 1-3 April 2012).

• Read about the laureates from Africa between 2003 and 2013
• Read about the Fellows from Africa for 2010, 2011 and 2012
• Full list of African Fellows since 2000-2013
• From UNESCO's journal, A World of Science:
  Read the interview of Professor Tebello Nyokong, a l'Oréal-UNESCO laureate
  Read the interview of Dr Khady Nani Dramé, a l'Oréal-UNESCO Fellow
  Read about the work of l'Oréal-UNESCO Fellow Blandina Lugendo
• Read more about the L’Oréal-UNESCO Awards for Women in Science