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ILRI PRESS RELEASE

A US$21 million investment is being made by Canada to enhance facilities for advanced biosciences research in and for Africa. This will enable African scientists to generate and apply cutting-edge science to develop home-grown solutions to some of the continent’s most pressing agricultural problems. Access to world-class facilities and training will allow the continent’s scientists to pursue their careers within Africa and will encourage those working abroad to return home.

The initiative is endorsed by the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), which regards the generation and use of new science and technology in Africa as key to its battle to eradicate poverty.

The initiative was announced today, 30 October, in Nairobi Kenya, with the signing of a memorandum of understanding between NEPAD and the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). The agreement covers the establishment of a Biosciences Facility for Eastern and Central Africa, with a hub at ILRI’s Nairobi campus linked to a network of laboratories across the region.

The Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) has pledged Canadian $30 million (more than US$21 million) to kick-start this initiative, which will produce technologies that help poor farmers to secure their assets, improve their productivity and income and increase their market opportunities.

The Honourable Susan Whelan, Canadian Minister for International Cooperation, launched the Biosciences Facility today at ILRI’s Nairobi campus. ‘If we don’t support agriculture in Africa and other developing countries,’ the Minister said, ‘we are not going to move ahead. Canada is revitalising its aid for international agricultural research. Our funding of this Facility is an example of Canada’s commitment to NEPAD’s principle of Africa’s ownership of solutions to Africa’s problems.’

Establishment of the Facility will involve upgrading laboratories at ILRI and elsewhere to state-of-the-art biosciences facilities. This will pave the way for establishment of a network of NEPAD-facilitated African ‘centres of excellence’ in science and technology. This pilot initiative will also provide significant funding for strengthening research capacity among African stakeholders and will include a fellowships program for African scientists.

The Biosciences Facility will be shared by the region’s research community. NEPAD and ILRI are keen to use the Facility to promote greater collaboration and innovative partnerships between African researchers and leading public- and private-sector research institutes worldwide.

‘Application of frontier science in sub-Saharan Africa is dismal,’ says Dr Romano Kiome, Director of the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI). The new Biosciences Facility will help redress this. By providing African scientists with world-class facilities and training, the power of the rapidly developing biosciences can be focused on the needs of poor farmers and consumers in the region. Research products are expected to include stress-tolerant, disease-resistant and nutritionally enhanced cultivars of locally important crops and safe new vaccines against livestock diseases that devastate household economies in the region.

Professor Wiseman Nkuhlu, Chairman of the NEPAD Steering Committee, explained that ILRI was chosen to host this pilot centre of excellence in Africa because ‘its work in biosciences is well recognised throughout Africa. ILRI has potential to become an important instrument for implementing NEPAD’s comprehensive Africa agricultural development programme’.

Kenya’s Minister for Planning and Development, the Hon Peter Anyang’ Nyong’o, gave his full support to the Biosciences Facility: ‘Smart partnerships are needed to jump-start science and technology in Africa,’ he said. ‘Research could play a crucial role in the agricultural revolution that Africa needs to alleviate poverty and improve economic growth.’

ILRI has experience in developing ‘smart partnerships’ with leading scientists and institutions worldwide. Its ground-breaking research to develop a new vaccine against the cattle-killing disease East Coast fever, for example, has developed into an innovative public-private partnership involving KARI, The Institute for Genomic Research (a not-for-profit private institute in the USA) and a veterinary pharmaceutical company as well as ILRI.

Developing new ways of organising and managing science will be an important feature of the Biosciences Facility. ‘Individual countries cannot afford to tackle serious agricultural problems alone,’ says Dr Carlos Seré, director general of ILRI. ‘We need to find ways of doing science that are more appropriate to poor countries. We want this Facility to be a model of new institutional arrangements. We believe that the Facility will attract many African scientists to remain in Africa working on African problems.’

Prof Nkuhlu concurs: ‘This Facility will allow African scientists from all parts of the region to contribute to world-class research on some of Africa’s biggest problems. These advanced research facilities will be shared, offering a “swing door” rather than an “ivory tower” to the wider research community.’