Association Plans Africa-wide Universities Research Archive

Olusola OyewoleThe Association of African Universities’ (AAU) African Research Innovation and Development (AfRID) network plans to set up a platform to serve as a database of all scholars in Africa and their research.

AAU is investing $60,000 in an electronic research archive that will automatically capture research output by African universities published in international journals. The electronic archive is expected to launch in 2025 to cover more than 2,000 universities and research institutions from across the continent.

University World News reported that the platform will comprise communities of practice for scholars based on key words and phrases that reflect their research and innovation engagements and will foster peer-to-peer engagement among its universities.

“By doing this, we can recognise the research strength of each university,” AAU Secretary General Professor Olusola Oyewole told the news outlet. “We can go to any university and tell of their research activities, and we will be able to know and identify the research contributions of African researchers in each of the selected development areas.”

Oyewole said the platform also will indicate networks of the scholars in other parts of the world the disciplinary, multidisciplinary, and transdisciplinary research grants and funding the scholars have garnered over the years. Some features and functionalities of the AfRID platform will be free to the general public, but advanced functions like statistics on institutional performance regarding research outputs will be based on a subscription basis.