Programme Director, Dr Phil Mjwara
Professor Ihron Rensburg, Vice Chancellor of the University of Johannesburg
Professor Kinta Burger, Dean of the Faculty of Science - University of Johannesburg
His Excellency: Dr Horst Freitag, German Ambassador
His Excellency: Mr Christian Meuwly, Swiss Ambassador
Learners, parents and educators
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen
Good morning to you all.
It’s a pleasure to be here at the beginning of the National Science Week 2012 celebrations.
Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you today.
Raising public awareness about science, engineering and technology, which has brought us together here today, is one of the key priorities of my department.
Raising public awareness of science, engineering and technology does not appear to be as important as the highly varied and advanced scientific activity taking place in our universities and science councils.
Yet it is, for the youth of today to become the scientists of tomorrow we need to foster awareness among pupils of the various careers that are available in the world of science, engineering, and technology.
And this is what National Science Week is all about.
During National Science Week we involve learners from all the provinces in activities that are aimed at exciting them, pricking their curiosity and exposing them to the wonders of science. We do this with the long-term view of attracting as many young people to careers in science, engineering and technology as possible.
Public awareness efforts really can make a difference. For example, with National Science Week we reach more than 200 000 individuals directly every year and reach in excess of a million people by means of radio and TV.
At the moment South Africans have much to be proud of in the world of science and technology.
Not many of you will have been to Carnarvon in the Northern Cape. I have. There is a place outside Carnarvon in the Northern Cape where we are preparing to host the Square Kilometre Array.
The Square Kilometre Array is a radio telescope, a very special and sensitive radio telescope, far more sensitive than anything that exists anywhere in the world today.
Astronomers explore the universe by passively detecting electromagnetic radiation emitted by celestial objects. Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will enable them to do this far more effectively than ever before.
This wonderful instrument, the SKA, will help astronomers and astro-physicians to find answers to a range of fundamental questions about the universe.
Astronomers will be able to study the formation and evolution of stars, galaxies and quasars - untroubled by dust. They will be able to study the evolution of galaxies and find out unique information about dark matter.
And astronomers will be able to look for alien intelligence, targeting many stars simultaneously.
SKA is one of the great science projects of the 21st century and it’s a project on which South African scientists collaborate with scientists from many other countries.
Our South African bid team spent a good decade in a race to win the bid to host this wonderful instrument up there in the Northern Cape. We won the bid. It’s a wonderful achievement. It will be a giant magnet for science in South Africa.
While our astronomers look out into the universe in order to look back in time, our palaeontologists look back in time through digging into the earth to find the bones of our ancestors. And as we were waiting to hear whether we had won the bid to host SKA, our palaeontologists were preparing to announce another remarkable find in Maropeng, the Cradle of Humankind.
In Maropeng there is another international project, different is size, different in scope to SKA, but another “big science” project based on South African soil.
Here paleo-scientists and other scientists ask fundamental questions about who we are and where we come from. It was the strength of their work that led to the establishment of the Cradle of Humankind as a World Heritage Site. It was the strength of their work that led scientists to recognise that the key stages in the evolution of humanity took place in Africa.
In 2008 a team from Wits University found fossils of a new species, Australopithecus sediba, in Maropeng. And then as we basked in the international glow of the decision to award SKA to South Africa, the paleo team announced that they had found a full skeleton trapped inside a rock.
They were only able to do this using modern technology and international collaboration. But they are not going to excavate this skeleton alone and by themselves. They are going to excavate in a lab that will be open to the world through video cams and streaming on the internet. It will be a wonder to behold.
These two big science projects will take South African science into the future.
But not all science is ‘big science’ or ‘rocket science’ - to switch to another metaphor. A lot of science is about simple inventions to improve our daily lives – ‘science for economic development’ – the theme of the science week. A lot of inventive science can be undertaken at school and at university. You can build gadgets and new technologies yourselves. You can turn waste into energy, you can work out how to purify water, or you can make better solar dishes or cell-phone masts.
But you cannot do this if you don’t understand the basics of physics and chemistry and the mysteries of mathematics.
The Department of Science and Technology (DST) has the Youth into Science Strategy to help you understand and overcome. As the name of the strategy suggests, it aims to facilitate a science, engineering and technology human-capital pipeline. Implementation of this Strategy takes place in collaboration with various organisations, including higher education institutions and science centres across the country.
We currently collaborate with 10 of the 23 higher education institutions including the University of Johannesburg and support 9 science centres. I am pleased that we are part of this campus’ initiative that benefits more than 600 learners in 38 secondary schools in the Johannesburg South District.
The learners benefiting from this initiative together with their parents are in our midst today.
I say to you: your job is to learn, to make sure that you excel in the two gateway subjects, mathematics and physical science. Take part in science expos and related Olympiads and competitions. That is how you awaken a desire to become a scientist.
Over the next week, National Science Week will take place in more than 89 sites around the country. They may be too few to accommodate everyone, but don’t hold back or you will regret it.
I would like to use this opportunity to thank the University of Johannesburg for hosting this launch. Professor Rensburg, my officials told me that the University staff they worked with in preparation for this event are a wonderful group of people, totally focused on making this day a success – thank you.
Your Excellency, Mr Christian Meuwly, the Swiss Ambassador, thank you very much for working together with us in this launch. Your exhibition on climate change emphasises the theme of the COP 17 that South Africa hosted in 2011: “Working Together, Saving Tomorrow Today”.
Together with the German Government, we have declared 2012 the German-South African Year of Science to celebrate our bilateral cooperation activities in science, technology and innovation. In this regard, 41 collaborative projects are featured to celebrate this Year of Science. You might have noticed the presence of some South African-based German companies as you tour the exhibition.
I am grateful that His Excellency, Dr Horst Freitag, the German Ambassador, is here to support this launch in the spirit of the partnership between the two countries.
With these words, I declare the National Science Week 2012 officially open.
Thank you.
Address by Naledi Pandor MP, Minister of Science and Technology, at the national launch of National Science Week, University of Johannesburg, Soweto Campus
