The National Commission for Science and Technology (NCST) has supported Mzuzu University and Centre for Social Research of the University of Malawi (Unima) with 79 million kwacha to support the strengthening of Research, Science, Technology and Innovation.
Mzuzu University has received 39, 810, 000 million kwacha while Centre for Social Research has received 39, 697, 914 Million kwacha.
Speaking after presenting a cheque to both institutions, Acting Director General at National Commission for Science Technology Gift Kadzamira said there has been inadequate funding and resources for researchers in Malawi to carry out research and as NCST they have what they call science and technology fund which support researchers with money to carry out research.
“The fund was resourced for the first time in 2021 with 291 million kwacha and at the moment in the 2023/24 fiscal year we have received 450 million kwacha. So we give out the money to researchers so that they are able to carry out research. This is research that will make impact, research that will solve our society challenges, research that is local not donor driven. So in that way, the grants that we have given to Mzuni and CSR are going to make positive impact to our local needs in the country,” said Kadzamira.
He added that it is important that people in the country solve the country’s problems and research is key to that.
According to Kadzamira, researchers have been carrying out research that has been donor driven and donor funded, meaning that such research answers to the needs of the donors.
“Funding our research using our own resources donated by the Malawi Government means we will be solving our own challenges which will make positive impact to the social economic needs of our country,” explained Kadzamira.
In her remarks, Acting Director for Centre for Social Research Associate Professor Chrissy Thakwalakwa commended NCST for the support saying it will go a long way because they did not have resources like computers and software for data analysis.
“So this support will help us to produce good quality data and also be able to train junior staff and even our post graduate students at UNIMA, to be very well equipped in skills to undertake research, to do with knowledge management and data analysis,” said Thakwalakwa.
She added that if Government and other entities continue to support researchers, they will be able to tackle problems that we have on the ground.
“When it’s donor support its usually an idea that comes from the donors and we have to dance to that idea but when we did our own we knew our problems,” she added.
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