Science & Technology, Stupid!

Saturday, Qanawu read this Reuters report from London with some interest: Tens of thousands of British children go to failing schools which should be closed because they are so poor, a senior government adviser said. “There are these 80,000 going to schools that are underperforming, and some very badly underperforming,” Taylor told the BBC in an interview. “They vary so much. Some are so bad they ought to be shut down quickly and some are struggling and need help.”

Bad GCSE results suggest about 500 UK schools are seriously underperforming, he added. The situation is far worse in Ghana. Figures seen by Qanawu show that in this year’s BECE in Ghana, the average pass mark for the over 300,000 students in English was under 20 percent in 2006, as compared to a little under 25 percent last year. The figures are even worse for general science, with several schools not getting a single pass mark.

When in November 25, 1964, Kwame Nkrumah laid the foundation stoneo Ghana’s Atomic Reactor at Kwabenya, his vision was to create a special scientific where members of the Academy of Sciences would live and work. We are reminded by E A Haizel that this was the Science City, with a ‘Palace of Science’ to contain laboratories, research institutes “and be a centre where the Academy would undertake pilot industries based on its discoveries.” It was to even have a National Bureau of Standards to test the quality of manufactured goods.

Last week, two prominent Ghanaians, one a politician and the other a scientist, re-iterated the indisputable fact that our pursuit of growth, development and prosperity must be driven by science and technology.

Edward Ayensu, Chairman of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, told The Statesman last week that “we are joking as a country,” until we begin to take science and technology (S & T) seriously. To buttress his point, he cited the way Science as a Ministry has faced several evictions in the last few years, which to him reflected how much of a priority it is considered. He could have further shored up his point had he disclosed (as Qanawu is now) that the CSIR uses 93 percent of its annual budget to pay salaries. Only 3 percent actually goes into research and development (R & D)!

Earlier in February, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Regional Integration and NEPAD, in referring students and lecturers to the role of KNUST to Ghana’s future perspective, stated, “History teaches us that the greatest resource a society can possess is its people. Ghana’s future depends on the accelerated growth of the economy, which is best fed by knowledge, particularly in the fields of science and technology.”

Again last Saturday at the UDS, he reiterated to students and lecturers that “Our future competitiveness as a nation and our quest for advanced status as a nation are fated for a crash-landing without the major impact of science and technology.”

He continued, “For our part as government, I think we can do much more to develop science and technology in Ghana. It would be cost-effective and significantly better if we take a pan-African approach to this. I would like to see an African Union whose leadership prioritise science and technology. An African Union, whose membership breaks down the geographical barriers between the continent’s scientists.”

In saying this the Minister in charge of NEPAD was aware that there is already in place the African Ministerial Council on Science and Technology and its Steering Committee for Science and Technology consolidates the science and technology programmes of the African Union Commission and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development.

And, that next January, the heads of member states of the AU will meet to discuss S&T in what will be a unique opportunity to support the continent's scientific renaissance. Africa's scientific community, for example, will have an opportunity to develop its case at a meeting of scientists and policy-makers planned for October in Alexandria, Egypt.

The meeting, which takes place between 27-30 October, will present its recommendations to the African Union summit next year. But, even before that, next week, 15-16 October, there is an inter-ministerial Dialogue on Building an African Network of Centers of Excellence in Water Sciences and Technology. Also, the importance of providing support for science and technology was emphasised by an African finance ministers meeting in Nigeria in November 2004 to discuss the initial draft of an international development report for Africa. This meeting identified “infrastructure, agriculture, science, technology and related tertiary education” as “top priorities towards realising Africa's development aspirations.”

Clearly there is an African recognition that S&T is the only way forward, no short-cuts. This point was strongly made last June, when science academies of the G8 group of the world's most industrialised countries and the Network of African Science Academies in a statement warned that Africa's problems will only be overcome if science and technology are made an integral part of the solution. “Without embedding science, technology and innovation in development we fear that ambitions for Africa will fail,” said the statement. The statement was signed by the science academies of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The need is to not only invest in S&T in Africa, but also to increase the continent's ability to solve its own problems by strengthening its higher education sector and helping nations train scientists. Thus, in 2005, ministers and senior government officials from a broad range of African countries met in Senegal to discuss what should be done to enhance science and technology capacity on their continent.

They endorsed the Consolidated Science and Technology Plan of Action worth more than $160 million, which sets out an ambitious set of projects to boost African science. It is still in a discussive stage, but there is the need for our media, scientists and all to put pressure on the politicians to make that recognition tell.

The projects listed in the plan, for instance, range from biodiversity research to laser technology. Every single one of them must be an Africa-led initiative, informed by the feeling that this would enhance Africa's efforts to tackle its own problems and economic needs in an integrated manner. The projects would operate at either a regional or continental level, complementing the parallel efforts of national governments to boost science and technology.

Over the last couple of years, Africa’s search for development roadmaps has been signposted by S&T and R&D pointers. Another example, the now defunct 17-member Commission for Africa set up to review the challenges facing Africa concluded that science and technology have a critical role to play in promoting economic growth and social progress. It acknowledged that scientific skills and knowledge bring about “step-changes” in areas ranging from health, water supply, sanitation and energy to the new challenges of urbanisation and climate change. But the report — published in March 2005 — also said that “critically, [scientific skills] unlock the potential of innovation and technology to accelerate economic growth and enter the global economy.”

As a result, said the commission, specific action for strengthening science, engineering and technology capacity "is an imperative for Africa." Strengthening universities across the continent would be important in meeting this need. In particular, it proposed that rich countries commit themselves to providing a combined sum of US$500 million a year over a ten-year period to this end. The Blair commission also supported the idea that a range of centres of research excellence should be created across Africa, each focusing on developing a strong research base and teaching the technical skills required in particular areas of high technology. It calculated a commitment of up $3 billion over a ten-year period to this end. Identifying the most promising areas of research for such centres, as well as their location, would be carried out in collaboration with the science and technology commission of the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) and the African Union.

An initiative being put together jointly by Akilapka Sawyerr’s Association of African Universities — the body that brings together representatives of almost 140 universities from across the African continent — with the London-based Association of Commonwealth Universities, and the South African vice-chancellors' association must be encouraged. These three bodies have already drafted a proposal for a ten-year investment strategy to address the weaknesses of African universities, many of which have been experiencing dramatic resource shortage in recent years. But, are the politicians ready to cough out funding? Is the private sector ready to vote with their bank accounts to encourage establishing that crucial town and gown link between the academia and business?

A study has shown that at present there are more African scientists and engineers working in the United States than there are in Africa. Yet, we need not see the brain drain from Africa as a one-way street – one country gains “brains” that are “drained” out of another. The new thinking is that both sides gain from this kind of migration – the creation and transfer of knowledge, the emergence of a skilled and educated workforce, and the fostering of commercial ties – are shared to some extent by countries on both sides of the equation. Our scientists who were forced by harsh local conditions to travel abroad have grown more in intellect; it is the duty of our leaders back home to work out how those expatriates can be made to contribute to Africa’s S&T growth.

Views expressed by the author(s) do not necessarily reflect those of GhanaHomePage.