M Mangena to announce 51 Research Chairs, 20 Sept

19 September 2007

South Africa's Science and Technology Minister, Mosibudi Mangena, will
officially announce a second cohort of Research Chairs in an initiative aimed
at invigorating research and human capital development in the country's
National System of Innovation (SNI). The initiative called the South African
Research Chairs Initiative (Sarchi) is a model accepted internationally to
develop requisite research capacities by attracting world-class researchers to
the implementing country. The initiative was first launched in December 2006
with the announcement of the first 21 Research Chairs.

The Department of Science and Technology and the National Research
Foundation (NRF) conceptualised Sarchi as a solution towards retaining and
attracting back qualified research scientists, reversing the systemic decline
in research outputs, focusing capacity at publicly funded higher education
institutions, science councils and research institutions, and contributing to
stimulating strategic research across the knowledge spectrum.

The initiative is expected to help South Africa retain and promote capacity
within the higher education sector while imparting much needed skills and
expertise into the country's research community. Research Chairs have been
awarded in disciplines as diverse as poverty and inequality research, urban
policy, customary law and indigenous values and dignity jurisprudence,
migration, language and social change, astrophysics and space science,
nanophotonics, and Immunology of Infectious Diseases in Africa, to name but a
few.

Date: 20 September 2007
Time: 11h00 to 13h00
Venue: Institute for Infectious Disease and Molecular Medicine (IIDMM)
Building, Grootte Schuur Hospital, Cape Town

Enquiries:
Celeste Tema
Tel: 012 843 6784
Cell: 083 399 0765
E-mail: celeste.tema@dst.gov.za

Issued by: Department of Science and Technology
19 September 2007
Source: Department of Science and Technology (http://www.dst.gov.za)