A week after Ethiopia unveiled its electric car, scientists there have set up the country's first science academy.

Ethiopia now joins countries like Tanzania, Mauritius and Zambia that are renewing their commitment to science and technology by setting up academies.

It is often argued that the disparity between developed and developing countries is due to the technology gap.

But given that rich nations like China now come to Africa for business,should the continent be focusing its energies on trade?

Should African governments pour more money into science? Or concentrate on business and trade? If you believe it neither has be one nor the other, then how can the two approaches be merged? If you are an African scientist, tells us your experiences.

Ayemokhia:

A week after Ethiopia unveiled its electric car, scientists there have set up the country's first science academy.

Ethiopia now joins countries like Tanzania, Mauritius and Zambia that are renewing their commitment to science and technology by setting up academies.

It is often argued that the disparity between developed and developing countries is due to the technology gap.

But given that rich nations like China now come to Africa for business,should the continent be focusing its energies on trade?

Should African governments pour more money into science? Or concentrate on business and trade? If you believe it neither has be one nor the other, then how can the two approaches be merged? If you are an African scientist, tells us your experiences.

Nice thread and good question.
My opinion---- I've always thought of this as something that need to be done by companies and schools in 9ja. Looking at the developed countries like the U.S, most of the technologies that are developed are invented by team of employees working for a company while some are invented by students who have access to good lab, equipment, and support. The support for the schools are mostly from private companies who build labs and continue to support the department. In turn, the company get some favor back from the govt for what they did to the sch.

I'm sure some us have heard about someone that invent something in Nigeria but never get any support to develop the tech into something marketable. Some of us also heard that some of those pple get lucky and are taken out of the country by a company from a develop nation.

I might be wrong on this next point---- I think some of the venture capitalist that are suppose to invest in this kind of tech business are not ready to invest for so long before they start seeing return on their investment cos tech biz can take years before you see you first income and the income will be so minute at first cos its very risky. Another is the kind of govt we have, every developing nation set aside money for inovation and development of new techs. Even if govt will not be in charge of it, they are sometimes the lender of big funds to companies that need huge fund for their invention, e.g America govt invested in Boeing to make airplanes. But 9ja govt only invest in biz that will allow them to steal money.