The January 2007 Summit of Heads of State and Government
The African Union has adopted the theme “Science, Technology and Research for Africa’s socio-economic development” for the January 2007 Summit of Heads of State and Government. This presents the AU an opportunity to focus on the role that S&T and innovation can play towards Africa’s socio-economic development. Key issues for consideration are Africa’s capacity to use S&T for socio-economic development; Africa human capacity in S&T and funding for S&T.
The UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) promotes the use of science, technology and innovation for Africa’s development, through policy analysis, advocacy and capacity building of its member States. ECA is also a bridge that brings emerging global UN issues on S&T to Africa, and takes Africa’s S&T issues to the UN. It achieves its objectives through alliances and partnerships, most notably with the AU, the ADB and with African S&T communities and networks of Centres of Excellence. The recent repositioning of ECA to better serve Africa’s development needs has created a new, focused Division of ICT, Science and Technology (ISTD), thus aligning S&T more closely with our partners for enhanced collaboration.
S&T funding in Africa is still lower than the 1%GDP as approved by the AU Summit in 2003 even in the richer countries. It seems the problem of funding is not so much a question of limited availability funds but the conviction in the value of such an investment. The return on the investment in S&T is not appreciated by the policy makers and even African industry. The challenge therefore is demonstrated by the means of few examples African S&T innovative projects that have socio-economic impact on the ground.
It is towards this demonstration that the Department of Human Resources Science and Technology and the ICT, Science and Technology Division (ISTD) of ECA have decided to jointly organize an exhibition of innovative African projects that can highlight the return on investment in S&T and innovation in Africa that will run in parallel with the 2007 Summit of Heads of States and Governments.