The laboratory now sits alongside the factory. This is justified by a strategic rapprochement between the academy and the industry through the signing of a framework agreement between the Institut National Polytechnique Félix Houphouët-Boigny (INP-HB) and Olam Food Ingredients (OFI). The signed text articulates cooperation around several concrete aspects. Students of the Institute will benefit from a reinforced welcome and supervision during their internships within OFI structures. Conferences, seminars, thematic workshops and company visits will complete the system, offering learners direct immersion in the professions in the sector.The research dimension is not left out, the dissertations, end-of-study projects, theses and applied work will focus on issues shared between the two institutions, in particular around the technological and logistical challenges specific to the agri-food industry. Continuing training and capacity building actions complete the structure, with a stated priority on the employability and professional integration of graduates.

For OFI, this alliance responds to a fundamental challenge, that of sustainably renewing its talent pool. The company intends to draw on INP-HB sectors to train engineers, technicians and experts in fields as varied as industry, logistics, finance, information technologies, law and even taxation.The partnership also provides for immersion programs directly on the group's industrial sites, as well as the creation of talent cohorts intended to gradually feed OFI's teams. An approach reminiscent of other similar initiatives recently established by the INP-HB with actors such as Olam Agri Rubber CI, in a broader logic of professionalization of the Ivorian agricultural and industrial sectors. SINOAFRIK at ANSSI. It remains to be measured, in the months to come, the real scale of the first cohorts trained and their effective integration into agro-industry professions.