25 November 2021  Issue No: 338

Research and higher education are crucial to change the ‘politics of pandemics’ being played out in the global COVID-19 vaccine distribution patterns, with G20 member countries having received 15 times more vaccine doses per capita than Sub-Saharan Africa.

The impact of school and university closures or partial closures caused by COVID-19 has only added to the challenges facing equity access to higher education now and for decades to come, a global conference to mark World Access to Higher Education Day or WAHED heard.

South Africa is the world’s most unequal society. This became significantly more visible when COVID-19 plunged the country into a state of disaster. It is against this backdrop that higher education institutions have been playing a key role in ameliorating the societal impact of the pandemic.

A student from Sierra Leone has won the US$100,000 Chegg.org Global Student Prize for inventing a device that uses kinetic energy from traffic and pedestrians to generate clean power. The award goes to an exceptional student who has made a real impact on society.

Nigeria’s inability to engage a large proportion of her youth meaningfully through job creation has the potential for social dislocation. The dire unemployment situation many graduates and those with advanced education in the country face is a cause for widespread concern.

Globally, the human population grows by about 83 million people annually. As a result, food demand is expected to increase between 59% and 98% by 2050. As outlined by Sustainable Development Goal 2 – ending hunger – there is an urgent need to explore novel alternative and sustainable food and feed production chains. Insects may be a part of the solution.

Hong Kong higher education may be thriving under a regime that is willing to pay for the research and development that it needs in order to stay in power, but from an academic freedom point of view, what is left is a regime-directed factory of higher education.

The European Commission is looking to ‘rebalance’ European Union research with China and is currently negotiating with China to draw up a joint roadmap for science and technology cooperation, but with stricter terms than in the past, including a requirement for openness and reciprocity.