Industrialisation: Is our money where our mouth is?
I went on YouTube. I searched for “Amazing technological wonders” of China, Korea and the United States.
What met my eyes did not amaze me; they made me giddy.
These countries are so technologically advanced that they are already living in 2050.
In 1953, South Korea was shattered by the three-year Korean War. Technologically and economically, that country is as old as Ghana.
A poor country even before the war, South Korea today ranks mid-tier in key emerging technologies such as biotech, quantum, and space.
China, as at 1957 (the year of Ghana’s birth), was so poor that they were, for survival, wearing the same design and quality of clothes.
The country’s GDP was 59.7. Then China began chasing science and technology. In 2023, the GDP was 17,794.8.
In 1998, when President Clinton visited Ghana, CNN came with him.
After looking around with their cameras, CNN’s correspondents concluded that “at this rate of development, it will take the Third World 250 years to catch up with the West”.
In technology, a Japanese AI wizard has developed an app that translates language instantly.
In conversation, press the microphone button and let the other person speak.
Release the button and hear the translation in your language – instantly.
This is where science is taking humankind. Permit me to qualify it: humankind minus Africa.
I couldn’t have written this last sentence if Kwame Nkrumah were alive. He knew where the world was moving to and therefore set up the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research.
(In contrast, only seven years ago, in 2018, the Ghana government was selling part of CSIR land to Chinese developers to build a hotel!!! It took the union to resist and thwart the move).
On March 9, 2017, I wrote in the Daily Graphic about “The Woman Who Saw Tomorrow”.
That lady is Professor RoseEmma Mamaa Entsua-Mensah, then Deputy Director-General of CSIR and Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences (another Kwame Nkrumah initiative)
This week, as my thoughts centred on science-induced development - the China, South Korea way - I read a paper delivered by her on May 26, 2021, at a lecture to commemorate GIMPA @ 60.
Her topic was ‘Post Pandemic Times - Strategies to Sustain and Strengthen Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics in Tertiary Education in Ghana.’
Last Wednesday, I called her up, sought and obtained her permission to quote copiously from her paper. Here are excerpts that aptly sum up what’s on my mind.
Still seeing tomorrow, she was at pains to remind her compatriots that “a country's economic development and stability are dependent on its ability to invent and develop new products.”
Hear her: “From medical scientists, who develop treatments for diseases, to civil engineers, who design and build a nation’s infrastructure, every aspect of human life is based on the discoveries and developments of scientists and engineers.
Consequently, it is vital for countries seeking to reduce their poverty levels to adopt new scientific research and technology.
“At the implementation level (in Ghana), there are two major public research bodies, namely the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research with 13 specialised Research Institutes and the Ghana Atomic Energy Commission (GAEC) with six Atomic and Nuclear Research Institutes operating.
Other STI-related institutions include Ghana Space Science and Technology Institute under GAEC, Cocoa Research Institute of Ghana (CRIG), Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, Centre for Plant Medicine Research (CPMR), GRATIS Foundation, Ghana Standards Authority, and Food and Drugs Authority.
For human resource development, Ghana has 13 public universities, 10 technical universities, seven chartered private universities, 44 Colleges of Education and eight Technical Institutes spread across the 16 regions of Ghana.”
Unfortunately – and that’s where Prof. Mamaa Entsua-Mensah starts tearing up - “Ghana’s current attitude to science is in sharp contrast to the efforts and resultant high benefits that countries such as Malaysia and South Korea, which were in similar economic conditions as Ghana in the early sixties, have attained.”
It is on record that “there are challenges of inadequate science infrastructure and academic staff at our tertiary institutions.
Many of the tertiary institutions lack modern science laboratories, basic science tools and equipment, which are crucial for scientific and technological training.”
What broke my heart in the Professor’s presentation was the fact that “the majority of the newly converted technical universities lack important laboratories for training high-level skills of practical work in industry.”
She proposes to Ghana that “Universities should link up with universities in the West or Asia (South Korea, Japan and Malaysia) to train young lecturers in innovations in STEM. These could be done as sandwich programmes.
But perhaps there is hope. In July this year, a ceremony was held somewhere in the Central Region at which the Rural Enterprises Programme (REP), under the Ministry of Trade, Agribusiness and Industry, officially handed over the management of 31 fully equipped Technology Solution Centres (TSCs) to the GRATIS Foundation.
Remember good old GRATIS? It’s been nearly 30 years.
Kudos to Elizabeth Ofosu-Adjare for chasing that dream.
