Research access and getting published: challenges in developing countries

10 July, 2017 Guest Contributor

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What does a day in the life of researcher or librarian in the global South look like? Here, university staff from Uganda, Zimbabwe and Ghana share their experiences of their daily work, accessing information and publishing research findings. Interviews by Katie Lewis Translating research into practical solutions is vital for overcoming big global challenges like hunger, disease, inequality and climate change. But for these practical solutions to be effective, it is important to understand the local context. In-depth and locally generated knowledge is key to solving local development issues.

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Why opening up access to research findings in the global South will accelerate international development

19 June, 2017 Guest Contributor

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Information access

Dr Nilam Ashra-McGrath works for COMDIS-HSD, which is a consortium of NGOs in Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Swaziland and the UK, and the University of Leeds, that does research on health service delivery interventions for a range of communicable and non-communicable diseases. In this post, she shares some of the challenges that the knowledge sector faces and reflects on the importance of access to research for NGO researchers. Research findings should be as accessible as possible. To my mind, there’s no doubt that opening up and speeding up access to research will be a powerful force in meeting international development targets. Giving access to everyone – citizens, NGOs, students, activists, government staff, donors and philanthropists – has the potential to reduce the amount of duplication in research and increase the level of scrutiny as to how research is funded, interpreted and used by different parties. This enables citizens to hold multiple parties to account.

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Overcoming challenges to research access in Sri Lanka

13 June, 2017 Guest Contributor

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Information access

Vasanthi Thevanesam is Emeritus Professor at the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. In the context of her own research on infectious diseases, she explains why access to the latest research is so vital for academics and clinicians in developing countries. Large chunks of the population in many tropical countries, like Sri Lanka, are exposed to a number of infectious diseases rarely encountered in more developed countries. In order to reduce the incidence of such diseases, we need to monitor them accurately. This is a challenge, because there is currently very little accurate and reliable information about many of these infections at the local level in Sri Lanka.

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Strengthening libraries improves research access in Kenya

6 June, 2017 Guest Contributor

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Information access

Dr Beatrice Achieng’ Odera-Kwach – the Senior Assistant Commission Secretary/Head of Department for Library and Information Services at the Commission for University Education in Nairobi, Kenya – shares her view on how strengthening libraries can help to overcome the challenges to research access in Kenya. Improved access to published research supports national and international development by improving education, accelerating discoveries and facilitating the sharing of knowledge. So, what concrete actions can be taken to enhance provision of and access to research literature in Kenya?

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Challenges of facilitating research access in Bangladesh

22 May, 2017 Guest Contributor

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Information access

- Dr M. Nazim Uddin is the Head and Senior Manager of the Library and Information Services Section at icddr,b, an international health research organization based in Dhaka. He gives a librarian’s perspective of the challenges of research access in Bangladesh What should a library look like? For me, it should have five basic components: a building, professional staff members, resources (such as furniture and print and e-literature), budgets and users. In Bangladesh, the two most difficult components for librarians to manage are budgets and resources.

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