Harness power of science, technology to spur growth - Prof. Tom Ogada to African govts

African governments and policymakers have been called upon to increase investment in research and harness the power of science, innovation and technology (STI) to spur growth on the continent.

In line with that, they must commit at least one per cent of their gross domestic product (GDP) to tackle the myriad of problems facing the citizenry.

The Executive Director of the African Centre for Technology Studies, Professor Tom Peter Migun Ogada, who made the call, said: “Today, not a single African country has released one per cent allocation of GDP for research and development to address the problems of poor health care, food insecurity, education, youth unemployment and low industrialisation.” 

Event

He was addressing a two-day Science Councils Granting Initiative (SGCI) Science Technology and Innovation Strategy (STISA) 2024 consultative workshop in Accra yesterday.

The event was attended by heads of research councils and funding agencies from 17 African countries to discuss, gather inputs and deliberate over the draft Science, Technology and Innovation Strategy for Africa (STISA-2034).

They will also assess the state of the STI ecosystem in Africa, at both the national and continental levels, and discuss how the SGCI can effectively position itself to contribute, influence and enrich both the development and implementation of the STISA-2034.

They would then submit an SGCI position paper to the African Union Commission Task Force and Drafting Team to enrich the development of STISA-2034.

Funding challenges  

Prof. Ogada said one of the challenges that was identified during the implementation of STISA 2024 was lack of funding for research and development activities.

He said unlike African countries, developed nations appreciated that for any country to develop, there was the need to put more resources into research and development.

“This is where you find that European countries had an average of two per cent of their GDP for R&D and the Asian Tigers that most African countries are benchmarking are spending in excess of two and three per cent.  

“This does not mean that you have to be rich to increase the percentage of your GDP, and the fact that none of African countries has realised the one per cent GDP is a clear indication that we have not appreciated the importance of investing in science and technology to address our problems,” Prof. Ogada said.

SDGs

With six years away from the deadline to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), he said that African nations were lagging  behind in the realisation of several of the goals.

Prof. Ogada said the only area countries on the continent had performed well was climate change.

“We are performing poorly in health, education, agriculture and nutrition, food security and poverty eradication.

“So we have, therefore, come to realise that for Africa to make a big difference and realise the attainment of the SDG goals within the next six years, there is the need to deploy science, technology and innovation on a scale that can have the highest impact,” he added.