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Tag Archives: Ethiopia
Firm foundations: access to high-quality materials-science information underpins Ethiopia’s construction work
This week, INASP’s Anne Powell spoke at the UKSG Forum in London. In her presentation, she reflected on the role that INASP plays in supporting the research priorities of countries like Ethiopia. At the UKSG Forum on Wednesday 18th November I was lucky enough to present one of the lightning talks in the afternoon session on “Supporting authors from an HEI perspective”. Having heard experiences from the Universities of Nottingham and Huddersfield in the UK, I was able to share some perspectives about developing-country research. The example that I shared was from my visit to Ethiopia earlier this year when I saw the amount of construction taking place, notably of seven-storey office or apartment buildings. These, my Ethiopian hosts told me, are owned by Ethiopians and destined for occupancy by Ethiopians, truly feeding into the local economy and development. The new buildings are situated on roads that double up as … Continue reading
Tagged Access, AuthorAID, conference, Ethiopia, UKSG
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“Digital development” – the last 100 metres
Tech-solutionism is fairly common in the development sector; we regularly hear that a new widget or (increasingly) the latest app is going to transform some aspect of service delivery or save innumerable hours of time. The same thinking has swamped much discussion on higher education (HE) in the last few years, an issue typified by recent talk about MOOCs. And, as the development sector looks increasingly at the role that higher education has to play in transforming societies and economies, the streams run together. Of course technology plays and has played a vital role in development – in medicine or agriculture for example – and technology and online learning offer huge possibilities for HE. But sometimes it feels like we’re caught in our own hype. Undoubtedly, better broadband connectivity, greater mobile penetration, more students with smartphones and laptops – these are all changing the possibilities for learning, and for the way universities … Continue reading
Tagged Bandwidth, Bangladesh, BanglaJOL, E-learning, E-resources, Ethiopia, Journals Online, Kenya, LAMJOL, Moodle, Nepal, NepJOL, SLJOL, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Uganda, Vietnam, Zambia
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Building capacity of Africa’s library consortia
Jon Harle reports on the recent library consortia meeting in Addis Ababa about building strong foundations for research to deliver African Union’s ‘Agenda 2063’ Last week’s workshop in Ethiopia wasn’t about libraries. It was about taking a vision of research and higher education – a vision of enabling development, tackling critical problems, improving the delivery of basic and much-needed services, preparing Africa for a changing world – and pulling that down to the detail of skills, of organizational processes and structures, of defining and addressing priorities through the incremental, day-to-day steps through which capacity is developed, services improved and progress made. One of my frustrations after the Senegal African Higher Education Summit in March was that we weren’t discussing the ‘how’ – and realising these ambitions for research and higher education will depend on taking high-level goals and translating them to real and sustained improvements in myriad areas, so that … Continue reading
Library consortia sharing expertise: A small meeting tackling important issues in Addis Ababa
Addis Ababa is used to hosting big and important meetings. The African Union and UNECA are both based here. A few weeks ago the UN Financing for Development conference brought several thousand visitors to Addis Ababa. And on Sunday evening President Obama flew in from Kenya. But this week Addis is also playing host to a smaller, quieter event – but an important one nevertheless. Seven library consortia have come together in Addis, hosted by the Consortium for Ethiopian Academic and Research Libraries (CEARL) and facilitated by INASP, to spend five days sharing ideas, learning, and collectively identifying solutions to some of the many challenges they share. But library consortia aren’t just clubs or networks of libraries: they play a key role in enabling a strong and effective research and knowledge system. By enabling their member institutions to collectively purchase online journals and books, consortia are making a critical contribution … Continue reading
Tagged Africa, capacity building, Consortium development, E-resources, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, library, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe
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AuthorAID mentee discusses first publication
Recently, we came to know that Ms. Bezaye Taye, a food science researcher in Ethiopia, has published her first research paper in a peer-reviewed journal. She has kindly agreed to answer some questions for the benefit of other early-career researchers in the AuthorAID community.
Tagged Academic publishing, Africa, AuthorAID, Ethiopia
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