Professor Ezin, African Union
Professor Lyakurwa, African Economic Research Consortium
Dr Mark Suzman, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Dr Connie Freedman, International Development Research Centre (IDRC)
Professor Muhongo, International Council for Science
Distinguished guests, colleagues, ladies and gentlemen
It’s a pleasure to be here this morning.
What can South African universities do to support higher education in Africa?
First, we need to sustain our African partnerships.
We need to develop and nurture national higher education systems as the building blocks of sub-regional and regional systems, without which we cannot hope to participate meaningfully in partnerships.
We are seeing something of a renewal in enrolments at sub-Saharan African universities. Enrolments in sub-Saharan African universities tripled between 1991 and 2005, expanding at an annual rate of 8.7 percent, which is one of the highest regional growth rates in the world.
However, growing enrolments led to a fall in funding. Over the same period, the spending per student declined from an average of US $6,800 per year to a low of US $981 in 2005 for 33 countries.
Of course, this was not unique to Africa, as rapid student enrolment growth at this time throughout the world led to a decline in government funding.
We also see a renewal in the growing number of African students looking for higher education elsewhere in Africa and abroad.
Studies show that the international mobility of students has increased significantly over the past 10 to 15 years.
Traditionally, the majority of mobile students came from the less developed countries and four in every five studied in the OECD countries.
Other directions of student flow are now emerging, such as within the commonwealth countries and south-south or north-south flows.
The reasons for this shift include cost factors, increased competition in the market and skills shortages.
Africa’s outbound migration of students and professionals has some benefits in creating networks favourable to Africa, and sharing knowledge about Africa with others around the world.
We can, nevertheless, increase capacity and opportunities in our countries and within the region itself.
We should aim to attract talented individuals from other parts of the world.
I think the Department of Science and Technology (DST’s) Research Chairs initiative is a model that promises to be very successful, and has been successful in other countries.
Second, institutional differentiation requires regional cooperation.
In pursuing differentiation, we must be strategic.
Not all universities can be research intensive. For instance, Africa’s sub-regions could agree that a selected group of institutions should be developed as research intensive. This does not mean the relegation of other higher education institutions to a second-class status.
It’s worth remembering that in the United States (US) and the United Kingdom (UK) less than five percent of universities are research-intensive, but that does not mean that all the other universities do not undertake research. They have all worked out what is good for them, what they can achieve, and they have focused clearly on those niche areas.
If we are to build, selectively and systematically, research-intensive universities on the continent, we must look towards new and innovative partnerships to support our vision.
Networks of researchers transcending national and regional boundaries are a growing characteristic of knowledge creation in the twenty-first century.
Furthermore, countries with an internal capacity to research local issues are better positioned to participate in global networks.
This resonates with the objectives of the emerging partnership between India, Brazil and South Africa (IBSA) where building the identification of research themes has been informed by each country’s unique research strengths and strategic advantages to address development challenges shared by three partners.
Postgraduate studies can also be supported by way of regional collaboration, through, amongst others, joint programmes and supervision. Such collaboration can also be extended to include international partner institutions. A number of models exist of such partnerships including the South Africa-Norway Tertiary education programme that has promoted joint postgraduate programme development by universities in the region.
Africa also needs large numbers of high quality undergraduate institutions focussed on meeting the professional and other skills needs of developing communities and nations.
They, too, like the research-intensive universities, must be appropriately funded. The early history of the land-grant universities in the US may provide s with an interesting model.
Access to fast broadband is critical. It is the key to strengthening teaching and learning and enabling collaborative partnerships in the region and beyond.
Third collaboration and partnerships between north and south can benefit Africa.
At the end of 2007 the African Union (AU) and the European Union (EU) established a science partnership, a partnership involving 53 African states and 27 EU countries. The African Union has set out 19 priority areas for research, from biotechnology to satellite monitoring, from water management to sustainable forests, from internet access to a virtual campus.
The partnership will invest in research capacity. Developed nations must invest in rebuilding African universities, and provide funding for scientists to pursue postgraduate and postdoctoral work in Africa. In today’s globalised and interconnected world, we encourage brain circulation through cultural and material incentives. We need to support Africa to become an attractive location to pursue high quality research.
Four in ten African scientists live and work in OECD countries, according to the Network of African Science Academies (NASAC), and this has crippled research development in Africa.
In closing, let me say this: there are many ways that OECD countries and OECD universities can rebuild African universities.
Here is one example that Dr Mark Suzman of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will know.
Under pressure from students, Edinburgh University is the first British university to license research to pharmaceutical companies only on condition that poor communities get life-saving drugs at cost price. The university now requires pharmaceutical companies to supply cheap drugs to developing countries in return for using patents held by the university.
The Gates Foundation and the Clinton’s AIDS initiative have supported and promoted this idea.
In my view it gives practical effect to a university’s commitment to community outreach.
Students at Edinburgh are determined that every health-related innovation developed in campus laboratories is available in developing countries at the lowest possible cost.
Innovation in universities is not simply about bringing products to market for private profit.
As the green activist, George Monbiot, writes, “In principle, the more money we spend on science, the better off us will be. But when public research is used for strictly private ends, it’s hard to see why we should fund it.”
Issued by: Department of Science and Technology
12 November 2009
Source: Department of Science and Technology (http://www.dst.gov.za)
