Access to scholarly information for research and teaching is a major concern for many academics and students in Africa, with numerous reporting that major journals are often unavailable to them. There are, however, a number of access initiatives providing discounted or free access to universities, and recent work at the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU), has, for example, found that many African universities have access to at least 80%of the top journals - comparable to universities in Europe and elsewhere.
There are several ways in which to gain access to electronic resources and research information, such as:
The Africa Desk is a new website which aims to connect researchers, enabling them to make contact with colleagues sharing similar interests, encourage collaboration between scholarly communities in Africa and the UK, and offer information and advice to support and facilitate research.
At its heart are two directories of expertise - the African Scholars Directory, and the Directory of British Africanists. African scholars, or UK academics working on Africa, are invited to submit their profiles to these. The latter forms the latest edition of the African Studies Association UK's (ASAUK) established directory.
By building parallel directories of African and UK based academics, it hopes to make it easier for researchers to identify and make contact with scholars sharing similar interests, with specific regional, country or linguistic expertise, or working in particular disciplines.
For more information, or to add your profile, please visit the Africa Desk website and select '+African Scholar' or '+UK Africanist' in the top right hand corner. All records will be reviewed by our editors before going live.
EDULINK - financed by the European Union and implemented by the ACP Secretariat, funds cooperative projects between Higher Education Institutions in the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the EU Member States - has launched a redesigned website to better promote the programme and its projects, increase its news coverage, and enable better exchange of ideas. For an overview of the EDULINK programme, please have a look at the guides in our publications section, or visit the EDULINK website.
A recent article in the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU) June/July VC-Net newsletter, reports on the World Bank's latest book. 'Financing Higher Education in Africa', presents a portfolio of tools and policies, and provides the practical 'how to pay for it' component to support its 2008 'Accelerating Catch-Up' report. While local contexts are acknowledged, it is clear that the continent is not to be regarded as a 'special case' when it comes to the funding toolkit which is suggested.
A recent report, released by the United Nations Development Programme, titled “The path to achieving the Millennium Development Goals: A synthesis of evidence from around the world”, vividly illuminates for the international community the path to creating a more healthier and richer world it envisioned a decade ago when it adopted the Millennium Development Goals.
The publication draws upon the national experience of 34 countries — 20 of which are in Africa — that have completed their national MDG assessments and shows trends in progress, successes, failures and the impact of the recent global crises.
It asserts that, while there is no one approach that could guarantee a country’s success across the board, with national commitment, innovative policies and pro-poor economic growth, the MDGs are within reach.
“These second generation of national MDG reports are critical because they provide us with an in-depth understanding of what drives and constrains progress”, said Usman Iftikhar, who led a team of specialists for the development of the report. “The previous national reports were more of an advocacy tool; this time, we have concrete country-level evidence that gives us rich experience and guidance on what to do to make progress in the next five years”.
To find out more, or to download a copy of the report, please click here.
