Occasional Paper No. 11

About half of the forestry and related research manpower in the SADC region is trained to the level of M.Sc. and Ph.D. and has at least four years of experience after obtaining these academic qualifications. Whilst this is indicative of a fairly satisfactory number of trained and experienced forestry researchers in the region, it also implies that about half would require more training and scientific exposure.
In Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Tanzania, most of the qualified researchers (with the qualities mentioned above) are found in university faculties and departments. Their availability for research is limited because of commitments to other equally important activities like teaching, extension and consultancy work.
South Africa, Botswana and Swaziland have a strong private sector forestry, which explains why most of their researchers are found in this sector as opposed to the other countries in which practically all the researchers are found in the public/government sector. There is an absence of private forestry sector research in all but these three countries.

Financial resources

There is considerable annual variation in research funding, either from external or internal sources, mainly due to political and economic externalities. This is creating serious strains on the institutions, restricting their ability to implement their research agendas, let alone safeguard their own survival. A good balance between local and foreign funding is desirable to cushion the institutions from adverse effects of externalities, like national currency devaluations which can seriously undermine the purchasing power of the institutions, reducing their ability to sustain research activities. However, such balance should be sought while, at the same time, cultivating self-financing mechanisms within the institutions.
The absence of a strong private sector in forestry is indicative of a very poor market for research output in many of these countries (excluding South Africa), and tends to favour the continuation of government financing of forestry research until the private sector in forestry develops appreciably. Also funding of public-good research will for a long time continue to be funded by national governments and the international community as there is little financial incentive for the private sector to undertake such research.

Adequacy of research capacity to support decision making

About 17% and 28% of the institutions surveyed allocate more than 20% of their budgets and staff time, respectively, to extension activities, i.e. making contacts with users of their results. The universities are weaker in this regard compared with the other institutions, and this may be due to the teaching and consultancy commitments which are other essential tasks for university scientists. In general, low interaction with users of research results raises questions on the relevance of the research undertaken by these institutions, and how they formulate their research priorities and programmes. The economies of these countries are increasingly becoming market-oriented and with considerable involvement and promotion of the private sector. It is therefore likely that research will become demand-driven, making contacts with user groups of research results an inevitable research norm.
There is an abundance of information in these institutions, some of which is from previous evaluations; many undertaken to satisfy external reporting requirements to governments and donors. Very few institutions use internally generated information as part of a self-improvement strategy. This is a reflection of the low level of sophistication in managing research available in many of these institutions.

Linkage between the research institutions and other relevant institutions

About two-thirds of the institutions surveyed reported frequent interactions with forestry-related and non-forestry research institutions in their own countries. The majority of the institutions regard such interactions as being moderately beneficial. These fairly high frequencies of contact reported, accompanied by high levels of satisfaction derived from such interactions, is indicative of the current potential for collaborative research in the individual countries.
Almost half of the institutions had occasional interactions with educational establishments in their own countries; while the other half had more frequent contacts. The majority of the institutions regard such interactions as being moderately beneficial. These educational institutions have some capacity for research and can provide training for staff from research organisations. However, the poorly resourced research centres, those who would benefit most, generally interact less with educational institutions. This could be indicative of a low level of research activities as well as staff training and development activities.
The majority of the institutions reported frequent interactions with foreign institutions and viewed such contacts as being very beneficial. Benefit was greater from interacting with foreign institutions than from those within their own countries. The international bodies have more to offer and share than local ones. The level of interaction with foreign institutions may also be indicative of the scope or complexity of research undertaken by some.
Universities appear to interact less in comparison with the other surveyed institutions. This may be due to the emphasis given to research by university establishments in their teaching-research-extension/consultancy mission as compared to the research-extension/consultancy mission of the other institutions. With the exception of South Africa, universities in the SADC countries have more qualified manpower and are better equipped with research facilities than other institutions; indicating potential for increased collaboration in research.
Much as there are frequent and beneficial contacts between the SADC institutions, how these translate into co-ordinated collaborative activities remains unclear. SACCAR has the mandate to promote forestry-related research in the region; and hopefully it will institute a mechanism for such collaboration.

Adequacy of research-supporting resources

In about half of the institutions surveyed, laboratory and library facilities are poorly developed and equipped; in a few these facilities are completely absent.
About two-thirds of the centres have adequate computer facilities, in the sense that the majority of their researchers have access to computers. Of this sub-sample, about two-thirds have electronic mail connections and a few have local area networks. It is unlikely that many of the institutions with poor computer facilities can use more computer equipment given the small number of their scientists and small volume of work as indicated by their budgets. For these institutions, replacement of obsolete hardware and provision of appropriate software may be more relevant.
About two-thirds of the institutions reported a satisfactory mutual sharing of resources like laboratories, libraries and computers. However about half of the poorly resourced establishments reported very limited sharing of such resources, which could be indicative of a low volume of activities and inadequate skilled manpower.
Almost half of the surveyed institutions have field stations/centres/zones; facilities which provide them with considerable flexibility for experimentation in the field. However, about half of these are in poor condition and without adequate infrastructure; indicating that their full research potential is being under-utilised for the activities for which they were designed.
Several centres have a backlog of unprocessed data from field experiments and other records; sometimes stretching to over twenty years. Given that the region has considerable computing capacity, it would appear that shortage of skilled manpower and opportunities to share resources are most probably the relevant constraints; rather than inadequate computing/analytical facilities.

Adequacy of methodology for the study

The methodology chosen has a number of shortcomings, the most important being that the indicators do not encompass all factors influencing research capacity and cannot fully capture the institutional research capacity. Also much of the data relies on oral responses by the head of an institution or his/her representative to carefully explained questions, and this may expose the data to bias.
The methodology is simple to understand, implement and interpret. It also has the merit of combining a large body of relevant information, for example in the form of a chart, thereby providing a more comprehensive overview of individual institutions relative to the sample as a whole.
There is considerable scope for improving the methodology, for example through development of additional indicators, refinement of survey techniques and improvement of data quality and analysis.

Main constraints to research and capacity building

The study confirmed the continuation, in the region, of the six major constraints to effective performance and utilisation of research in Africa identified by the African Academy of Science (1994). These were:

insufficient collaborative research. This can be discerned from the level of interactions between institutions which is especially weak among the poorly resourced centres.
poor research and development linkages. This is indicated by low level of interactions with user groups.
inadequate flow of information and access to scientific literature. The weak interactions between institutions, especially the poorly resourced ones, and the unsatisfactory state or absence of library facilities are factors which confirm this.
poor research-education linkages. The study results indicate fairly weak interactions between research and educational establishments in the respective countries and the contacts were viewed as moderately beneficial.
low sustainability of research programme support. Declining funding of research, in real terms, and especially from local sources, in addition to inadequate research manpower were observed to be constraining research development.
lack of co-ordination with donors.

Recommendations

On the results of the study

In view of the fact that the region has insufficient research manpower and half of that present needs more training and scientific exposure, one of the priority areas for improving research capacity in practically all SADC countries would be manpower training and development.
As the economies of the SADC countries become more market-oriented making research increasingly demand-driven, the burden of funding research should gradually be transferred to the emerging private sector in forestry. However, public-good research should continue to be supported by governments and international organisations since this is not the domain of the private sector; at least for the foreseeable future.
One way of dealing with the decline in real value of funding for research is for national institutions to maintain a good balance between local and foreign funding, so as to cushion themselves from the adverse effects of political and economic externalities, like devaluation of local currencies, which erode the value of their budgets, effectively constraining their capacity to sustain and/or develop new research activities.
Much as it is advisable for national institutions to be aggressive in attracting foreign funding for research from donors and other sources, self-financing measures (in local and foreign currencies) should be vigorously pursued due to the ephemeral nature of donor funding arrangements. Reliance on a single donor makes an institute very vulnerable to changes in funding arrangements that are beyond its control.
Institutions should adopt the concept of managing a research 'portfolio'; relatively few expensive research activities should be balanced by a greater number of cheaper ones, long-term projects balanced by short-term studies. Similarly institutes should attempt to diversify funding sources and assess their likely response to various funding scenarios during the selection of research activities.
Library, laboratory and computer facilities should be made available where they are absent and be reinforced where they are inadequate; without them the capacity for research becomes seriously constrained, even in the presence of sufficient skilled manpower. Likewise, field stations/centres and maintenance of trial plots should be reinforced where these facilities are essential to the research agenda.
Inadequate manpower and financial resources, coupled with paucity of research support facilities dictate that national and regional research agendas should be tailored to match available resources.
The considerable potential for greater collaborative research activity presents an important opportunity to enhance the research capacity of individual institutions, countries and the region as a whole.

On the adequacy of the methodology used in the study

Since many factors affect the capacity to conduct research it is advisable to develop additional and more comprehensive indicators, rather than relegate many important aspects to qualitative assessment.
It would be advisable to collect time series information for the indicators, to the extent possible, so that other analytical approaches could be used to complement the analysis made in this report.