After three decades of attrition and neglect, higher education in Southern Africa, and in the Sub-Saharan region, is on the move. The last few years have seen encouraging stirrings of new life.
In July 2009, at the World Conference on Higher Education organised by Unesco in Paris, special attention was given to "the challenges and opportunities for the revitalisation of higher education in Africa".
The conference recognised higher education as "an important tool for the development of the continent", and that universities would be more effective in this task through collaborations at the national, regional and international levels. Indeed, the conference saw higher education as "an instrument for regional integration".
In 2008, the Southern African Regional Universities Association (SARUA) published the first detailed baseline research into higher education in the 14-nation region. The research looked in particular at funding frameworks, the state of public science, interactions between universities and the private sector, and the key areas for action concerning the revitalisation of higher education in the region. Significantly, the title given to this research was Towards a Common Future.
And the international funding agencies have not been slow to adjust to the changing imperatives. In 2008, the World Bank was stating that "the key to economic success in a globalised world lies increasingly in how effectively a country can assimilate the available knowledge and build comparative advantage".
Kotecha is the CEO of the Southern African Regional Universities Association
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