Networking in Africa: using ICTs to exchange research and policy knowledge

How can African research become more accessible to both African and external policy-makers and researchers? How can African researchers exchange knowledge and expertise? Research by the International Institute for Communication and Development (IICD) for Comunex explores ways in which policy-makers in Africa can network and share knowledge between research networks.

There is an urgent need to rethink how research and policy communities disseminate information. New technologies offer collaboration opportunities and tools to help share and disseminate information or to build joint Internet portals and information services. Commissioned by Comunex, the author suggests how the establishment of a research policy portal by the African Policy and Research Networking Programme (APREN) could help to make research more effective, more visible and more connected to policy.

The APREN portal should aim to provide access to a relevant knowledge base consisting of different knowledge resources produced by different organisations, stored in electronic format, accessible over the Internet and easily searchable via databases. The APREN portal could provide:

• a list of events in Africa and issues important to African policy agendas
• a searchable directory of African research and policy institutes, and a ‘who’s who’ of African researchers
• a search facility across websites and databases of African research and policy institutes
• an index to discussion groups, communities of practice, networks, and electronic conferences, reference and resource centres
• support knowledge networking facilities and identify new and existing communities of practice so that individuals can collaborate and communicate around shared subjects or interests
• technical facilities, advice, training, assistance in managing and maintaining communities or networks, and hosting and management of online discussions.

Research findings include the following guidelines:

• APREN needs to ensure that its activities are directed towards the needs and concerns of policy and research communities in Africa and use African expertise and resources.
• Ownership of the portal should be shared with participating African organisations.
• There should be clear benefits for participating organisations and individuals.
• Bringing policy-makers into the community, as contributors and participants, is crucial and would require additional efforts such as attention to packaging and placement of research content, as well as the use of advocacy skills.
• The technical skills of contributing individuals and organisations will need to be updated regularly.

Policy recommendations for the establishment of an APREN portal include:

• African research and policy institutions and networks need to create an alliance, pooling their expertise and resources to develop and run an African research policy portal.
• Foreign or international groups could affiliate in supportive roles.
• Alliance members should invest in their own communication and dissemination capacities to build their knowledge base.
• Attention should be given to building and enhancing knowledge bases, fostering knowledge networking and developing the skills and capacities needed for such networking.
• Links should be made with similar global initiatives as a way to quickly develop, borrow, and adapt tools and methods.

Source(s):
'Investing in knowledge: managing and exchanging research and policy knowledge in Africa through ICTs', Comunex, by Peter Ballantyne, March 2001
'Special issue: Creating and communicating local development content', INASP Newsletter No. 19, by Peter Ballantyne February 2002
'Collecting and propagating local development content: Synthesis and conclusions', IICD Research Report No 7, by Peter Ballantyne May 2002

Funded by: European Commission via Comunex

id21 Research Highlight: 19 December 2002

Further Information:
Peter Ballantyne
Team Leader, Knowledge Sharing International Institute for Communication
and Development (IICD)
PO Box 11586
2502 AN The Hague
The Netherlands

Tel: +31 (0)70 311 7311
Contact the contributor: pballanytne@iicd.org

IICD

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