Accra, July 15, GNA - Ms Sherry Ayittey, Minister of Environment Science and Technology on Wednesday observed that public universities in Ghana have developed institutional repositories that would make available research and development outputs accessible to the general public.

The Environment Minister said this at the opening ceremony of the second conference of the Africa chapter of the International Association of Agricultural Information Specialists in Accra. It was organised on the theme: "Towards Opening Access to Information and Knowledge in the Agricultural Sciences and Technology in West Africa."

She said the Association of Africa Universities was leading an initiative on the development of full-text-data based of African thesis and dissertations to make information especially agricultural information available to improve food security in Ghana. She said the initiative would also make research output from Ghana and Africa visible to the outside world.

Ms Ayittey said many countries in Africa faced a host of problems such as environmental, health, economic and development problems such as pervading poverty, HIV/AIDS, inadequate portable water and weak economic growth.

"Science and technology if properly harnessed could play a major role in helping Africa to overcome these challenges," she said. Ms Ayittey said research into science and technology increased knowledge acquisition, adding that access to knowledge especially in the fields of agriculture, medicine, environment, climate change and technology could help create stronger social, economic and technical infrastructure that were essential in the development process.

She said science and technology was identified as an essential ingredient in the development process and corroborated a statement from the UNESCO that "assimilation of science and technological information is an essential precondition for progress in the developing countries". Ms Ayittey said access to and assimilation of scientific and technological information would empower people and local experts on the continent to find solutions to local environmental social, economic and developmental issues.

She said government would support policies that invested in basic and applied research to create new incentives for private innovation, promoting breakthrough in energy and medicine and improve education in mathematics and the sciences.

She said government had committed two per cent of the Ghana Educational Trust Fund to assist brilliant, average and needy students of tertiary and second cycle institutions for scholarship schemes for mathematics and science.

Research into science and technology had brought many modern communication technologies such as the Internet and mobile telephones. The Minister said that technology had made it easy to disseminate the content in digital format.

Dr. Monty Jones, Executive Director, Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa and 2004 World Food Laureate, said there should be a local ownership in the attempts to secure food security. According to him it must begin with the political will to develop and implement comprehensive food security strategies based on sound scientific evidence, domestic investment and clear directions. Dr. Jones called for the need for countries to establish information systems for monitoring market performance and measuring market failures.

He said most African countries that were agricultural- based needed agriculture to transform their economy.

Dr. Jones said ICT could transform the agricultural sector of African countries if the actors were ready to promote participatory, collaborative and impact oriented agriculture science and innovation by investing in Information, Communication and Technology (ICT). He said ICT was not just for the scientists but also for actors along the chain such as producers, traders and consumers.