Frans’ personal journal of the global LAMP AfricaOSH edition.

Saturday 24 - Arrival

• We arrive at night (20:10) at the Yaounde airport. An antigen test (Abbott Panbio ) is still mandatory to enter the country but is a complete mess, people skip it, and doctors let you leave before the result are ready.

Image of Mount Cameroon volcano from the plane.

• Controls at the airport due to the risk of terrorist attacks, partially due to the Anglophone crisis.
• Stephane (Mboalab CEO) and Yannick (also a partner of Mboalab and the person in charge of the commercial activities) pick us up from the airport. We dined in a new supermarket in the area that looked like a fancy Auchan. Yaounde's infrastructure has changed enormously since the last visit three years ago.
• They have changed the previously booked place of accommodation to the house of Thomas Mboa's younger brother, which is also the local leader of the area where the laboratory is also located.

Sunday 25 - Setting up the lab

• Trip to Yaoundes’ center with Yannick. Money exchange and a visit to a huuuuuge Carrefour. Carrefour aside, shops inside the mall are adapted to the local style… But the prices are the same as in Paris! Seems that is a place targetting high class.
• During lunch, we have an exciting conversation with Yann, where he points out that the future market is the local production of consumables (Eppendorfs, globes…), capitalizing on the already existing local cork and rubber production.
• First, visit Mboalab at night. The growth since last time is impressive. The old lab is now a community lab where people can freely experiment with the equipment. The business model is to sell people the enzyme they will require. There's a new space in the back where Mboalab's enzyme and reagents are produced. Currently, there is a capacity to produce Taq, retrotranscriptase, Bst-LF and DNA-loading dyes. They are building three more floors with a residence and a conference room.