Lahja Nashuuta
The government has fallen short of the commitment made by African governments to spend at least 1% of their gross domestic product on research and development (R&D), and it is far from attaining the global average of 1.7%.
This is according to the National Research and Experimental Development Survey by the National Commission on Research, Science and Technology (NCRST) released earlier this week.
NCRST CEO Anicia Peters said government expenditure on R&D decreased significantly from being the highest at 46% to a mere 3.3%, stressing that “there was less funding towards engineering and technology, medical and health, and human sciences”.
She further pointed out that research funding for transport, telecommunications, as well as infrastructure, industrial production and technology is low, while R&D on food and water security is not specified.
Speaking at the same event, higher education minister Itah Kandjii-Murangi acknowledged the shortfall in funding, stating that there is a need to increase government’s expenditure on R&D to steer science and technology to address societal challenges.
Kandji Murangi, said although Namibia has not been able to achieve 1% of the GDP target, the country has demonstrated a political commitment to attaining the target through Vision 2030, as well as the sixth national development plan.
The survey further revealed that currently, the GDP expenditure on research and development (R&D) accounts stand at 0.7%, of which the government has only contributed 0.02% in the 2021-2022 financial year.
Government’s funding towards research illustrates a decrease from 0.16% funding in the 2013-14 financial year when the institution carried out a similar survey.
The government is the second-lowest contributor, with only 3.3%, which is a significant decrease from 46% in 2013/2014 when it was the highest R&D spender.
The non-profit sector stubbornly remains the lowest spender with 2.5%.
The survey reveals that the higher education expenditure on R&D in the 2021/2022 financial year amounted to N$964 million, equivalent to 75.5%, while the Namibian business expenditure accounted for N$288.3 million or 21.7%, and that of government amounted to N$43.6 million.
Meanwhile, the not-for-profit institution’s expenditure amounted to N$33.1 million, which is equivalent to 3.3% during the 2022 financial year.
Most of the research funding channelled towards applied research accounted for the largest proportion of R&D expenditure in 2021/22 at 52.3%, while experimental development spending significantly increased from 26.6% in 2013/14 to 32.1% in 2021/22, and basic research decreased to 15.4% in 2021/22 from 19.5% in 2013/14.
Only 0.2% of the responding institutions did not classify the type of research.
The survey also reveals that the country has few researchers in health, science and engineering, and that there is a lack of research institutions.
The significant decrease in government funding for R&D is of great concern, the survey suggests.
The study recommends that the government should invest more in R&D and innovation to drive its own national R&D and innovation agenda, as opposed to international funders.
“More investment in engineering and technology for R&D investment into the manufacturing sectors, green hydrogen, oil and gas, critical raw materials and 4IR/AI will be needed to develop local human capacity and infrastructure. Infrastructure spending for national and accredited R&D facilities should increase to capacitate researchers in the country. Industrial production and technology expenditure is too low,” the report reads.
The report further said that targeted investment should be made in medicine and health science, as Namibia needs to invest in vaccine manufacturing and future epidemic preparedness, while providing universal healthcare across the country.