Django Weblog: The first PyCon Africa

Sponsorship

It's thanks to its sponsors that the event can go ahead. All the basic costs of the event are now covered and attendees from many African countries will be represented. However, the organisers are looking for further sponsorship for the financial assistance programme.

Travel, even within Africa and to a well-connected city like Accra, is expensive and difficult for many Africans. Entry visas to Ghana can cost $100-200 per person, which when combined with other expenses puts the event out of the range of a lot of potential attendees.

There's an opportunity here.

Sponsoring PyCon Africa means more people from across Africa will be able to attend, strengthening the network of the African Python community and building its expertise. We’ve already seen the results of this engagement within in Python, as African Pythonistas have advanced in their careers and contributed back to the software and the community (just for example, Anna Makarudze from Zimbabwe serves on the Django Software Foundation board, as Vice President of the DSF itself).

Companies interested in sponsorship should get in touch with the organising team via the website . Individuals can also contribute to the financial assistance fund via the GoFundMe page .

You can read more about the conference on the official website . Also Noah Alorwu and Abigail Mesrenyame Dogbe, two of the organizers, gave a great talk at DjangoCon Europe this year about developing their community - including an announcement for the first DjangoCon Africa next year!