Keynote address by the Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Prof Blade Nzimande, at the Bio Africa-Cphia Convention 2025, at the Durban International Convention Centre
Chair of BIO Africa, Dr Boitumelo Semete-Makokotlela;
Dr Nhlanhla Msomi, Non-Executive Chairman of Africa Bio and Special Advisor to the Vice Chancellor at the University of Cape Town;
Dr. Mlungisi Cele, Director General of the Department of Science, Technology and Innovation;
Mr. Nqaba Nqandela, my Special Advisor;
Ms. Ettewa Kadili, Regional Director of Eastern and Southern Africa, UNICEF;
Dr. Hisham Stait, Chairman of the Egyptian Unified Procurement Authority;
His Excellency Ambassador Amma Twum-Amoah, Commissioner for Health and Humanitarian Affairs and Social Development, African Union;
Esteemed Guest Speakers;
Participants and Distinguished guests from various parts of the continent;
Ladies and gentlemen:
It is a great pleasure and honour for me to address the BIO Africa-CPHIA Convention 2025 gathering- a conference that stands as a beacon for science, innovation, and collaborative progress on our continent.
Let me start by commending you for your foresight and courage in choosing the theme “Moving Towards Self-reliance to Achieve Universal Health Coverage and Health Security in Africa”.
Your theme highlights the important issue of “self-reliance”. We all recall how the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the vulnerabilities inherent in over-reliance on imported health products, but it also highlighted the tremendous potential of coordinated scientific and industrial action.
For this and other reasons, it is critical for Africa’s policy makers, researchers and scientists to understand that we can’t be confident about a sustainable future for Africa, if we don’t deliberately invest in the development of sovereign capabilities in all critical areas of human development, including health care.
Standing here among visionary minds and committed allies, I am reminded that collective action has always driven the most meaningful advances in public health and sustainable economic development.
Similarly, visionary political leadership and strategic commitment are far more than catchphrases; they represent the engine by which nations build robust innovation ecosystems and resilient domestic manufacturing capabilities in health.
This why we as the Government of South Africa, have consciously placed science, technology, and innovation at the heart of our country’s development strategy.
Through our Department of Science, Technology and Innovation (DSTI), our actions are guided by the Decadal Plan on Science, Technology and Innovation (2022-2032)- a framework unified by the vision that research must drive inclusive growth, meaningful social transformations and a sustainable future.
Our country’s Decadal Plan specifically identifies Health Innovation as a core STI priority, alongside energy innovation, and explicitly targets the development of domestic capabilities across the entire health value chain- from discovery to local manufacturing of vaccines, active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), and diagnostics.
Throughout recent years, this commitment has been translated into concrete mechanisms, which include the following:
- The expansion of the South African Research Infrastructure Roadmap;
- The strengthening of institutions and science councils like the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), and;
- The mobilisation of networks such as our Technology Innovation Agency and Science and Technology Parks.
These platforms have proven vital in forging a resilient innovative system capable of responding not only to national needs but also to regional and continental imperatives.
South Africa’s laboratories pivoted rapidly to diagnostics and clinical research, manufacturers mobilised to fill critical gaps, and our innovation ecosystem moved purposefully from crisis management to laying the groundwork for lasting transformation.
One of the attempts at transforming our country’s health care landscape has been the National Health Insurance (NHI), whose primary objective is ensuring universal access to health care.
The NHI also seeks to build sovereign state capacity and to realise this, we need to ensure that the NHI is supported by research and development. I should also state that the NHI has received a lot of opposition from some private healthcare providers.
This is probably because of the monopoly that some private health care providers have over key aspects of our healthcare system. As the South African government, we take the view that, as a country we can’t afford to have a health care system that perpetuates inequality.
Let me now turn to a truly historic development: the launch of the Africa CDC Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Plan in 2025.
Spearheaded by the African Union, Afreximbank, and Gavi, with a monumental $3.2 billion investment.
This plan aims to ensure that by 2040, at least 60% of all vaccines used in Africa are produced within Africa’s own borders. It is about more than new facilities or technology transfers; it is an integrated ambition—to equip Africa’s people, scientists, and manufacturers with the tools and skills to secure the continent’s health sovereignty.
The plan focuses on expanding manufacturing capacity for vaccines, biologics, and APIs, establishing regional hubs, implementing WHO-quality standards, and harmonising regulation through the African Medicines Agency.
Investments are likewise being channelled into targeted workforce development programmes, such as our nationally-led 'Skills for Industry' initiative—a model of which South Africa is a regional leader—to train 15 000 artisans in the next three years.
To enable the scale and impact of these efforts, we acknowledge the crucial role of international funders, whose partnerships are helping to establish regional centres of excellence.
Furthermore, we are stimulating private sector capacity, and mechanisms, like pooled procurement, to offer market assurance to our manufacturers and inspire new investment.
This continental momentum is fully mirrored in South Africa’s domestic work. The DSTI’s Vaccine Innovation and Manufacturing Strategy currently in development is supporting home-grown production platforms for diseases of both local and continental relevance.
Technical cooperation with Germany, the European Union, and GIZ—through initiatives such as SAVax Joint Action and the Team Europe Initiative MAV+ is bringing targeted support, specifically geared towards establishing robust mRNA technology platforms.
This includes providing GMP (good manufacturing practice) support, regulatory strengthening for our national regulator, SAHPRA, and essential business development expertise to our private sector companies.
This support is already yielding major benefits, notably with Biovac being poised to benefit from the GAVI-led African Vaccine Manufacturing Accelerator (AVMA), a critical initiative that signals assured demand and sustainability for African-produced vaccines.
Collaborative ventures with our agency, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), ensure that our workforce and technology transfer systems remain at the cutting edge.
This involves multi-sectoral partnerships across academia and the private sector, with a focus on harmonising regulatory and quality standards across African regions to de-risk market access. This comprehensive approach is designed to position South Africa not simply for local benefit, but as a leading manufacturing hub for the continent at large.
South Africa’s approach is deliberately harmonised with Africa CDC’s pharmaceutical manufacturing plan. We support the rollout of the African Manufacturing Market Intelligence Network and are investing in pooled procurement and harmonised regulation, seeking to catalyse a seamless, continental market for African-made health solutions.
Nationally, we are ensuring that funding—from the South African Government to blended finance partnerships—advances the entire pipeline: from early-stage research through to commercial scale-up and sustained impact.
As we move forward, the next imperative is to deliver on a scale. We are expanding our pathogen genomics and vaccine manufacturing programmes, with our genomics work exemplified by the nationally led 110K Genome Sequencing Study.
This comprehensive effort is critical to anchoring local capacity for the production of strategic biologics, including mRNA vaccine components and next-generation diagnostic tools.
Furthermore, we are actively looking at the feasibility of supporting One Health consortia that bridge human, animal, and environmental health, with an initial focus on zoonotic disease surveillance and climate-related health risks.
Critically, our policies remain anchored in inclusive development, expanding skills, supporting entrepreneurs, and using innovation as a vector for job creation and social improvement.
Colleagues, the Africa CDC Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Plan and our DSTI-led actions illuminate the potential of vision when paired with action.
Together, they prove that political will, scientific excellence, and cross-sectoral collaboration can transform Africa’s role in global health—from consumer to creator, from recipient to exporter, from vulnerability to sovereignty.
Our challenge and obligation as policymakers, researchers, and industrialists is to turn these plans into performance, and these ambitions into real changes in the lives of the people we serve.
In conclusion
I would like to thank all partners, innovators, and change-makers present, and invite continued collaboration as we drive forward Africa’s innovation renaissance—together.
Let us commit to leading with knowledge, investing with intention, and producing with purpose. Let us resolve that Africa’s future will be defined by the ingenuity and determination of its own people.
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