When will Africa produce a Nobel Prize in science? Perhaps the closest the continent has come is Philip Emeagwali, who many have dubbed the "father" of the Internet. But the African content on the Internet was a paltry 0.4% of global content a few years ago, and if South Africa's contribution was excluded, the figure was a mere 0.02%. Africans are members of the global village, but by 2001, out of the approximately 816 million people in Africa, only 5 million used the Internet. This disparity could be explained by the simple reason that while "cooperatives" of villagers in the Asian Tigers assemble computers for export to Africa, the African counterparts mend dusty roads in food-for-work programs.
There is need to fast-track our scientific enterprise, and make sure the voice of African scientists is unambiguous. What is the position of African scientists when the Food and Agriculture Organization dissuades the ...
