Research

Makerspaces are places where people gather to build projects, learn new technologies, and develop entrepreneurial opportunities. Open AIR is conducting research on makerspaces across the African continent.

By Vanessa Turyatunga Language shapes and reveals aspects of different cultures and identities. Through my Masters’ work on Yoruba religion, it has become evident to...

This 2013 book is the product of three years of literature reviews, expert interviews and scenario-building exercises by the Open AIR network. The authors trace the contours of knowledge and innovation in Africa from the founding civilisations to today’s current realities, and then set out the drivers of change that can be expected to shape innovation systems on the continent between now and the year 2035.

Introduction In 2020, Ethiopia, a country that has faced a refugee crisis primarily because of long-term conflicts, experienced a deadly war that displaced many Ethiopians...

By Chidi Oguamanam For the 35th time in 18years, experts have yet again gathered at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) headquarters in Geneva where...

Authored by: Caroline Ncube. This chapter provides an historical account of the development of IP on the African continent which highlights how the introduction of IP systems and their transposed legislation displaced existing knowledge governance systems and entrenched a primarily extractor-biased IP system.

On 10 June 2015, the Agreement establishing a Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) was signed in Egypt bringing together 26 African countries from three major regional blocs: the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the East African Community (EAC), and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Following the signing, the current phase of the TFTA negotiations are meant to cover five agenda items: trade in services, cooperation in trade and development, competition policy, intellectual property (IP) rights, and cross-border investment. The fourth of those five issues was the subject of the second Open AIR East Africa Distinguished Speaker Series presentation by Dr. Henry Kibet Mutai.

On June 10th, at York University’s Glendon Campus, the Canadian Association of African Studies hosted their annual conference. Dr. Tesh W Dagne and Dr....

Open AIR has just released a video, on our @Afrinnovation YouTube channel, highlighting the network’s current large research programme, “Regulation for Innovation Supporting Sustainable...

Our Open AIR researcher Dr. Erika Kraemer-Mbula is continuing her exciting research in South Africa about informal sector entrepreneurs. Informal entrepreneurship is receiving increasing scholarly and political attention in Africa. The continent’s booming youth population calls for an unprecedented need to create income and livelihood opportunities. Besides the traditional focus on formalisation, there is a growing interest in understanding the creative processes and innovations occurring in informal enterprises. However, evidence remains scarce, and research on informal enterprises still represents a relatively new and unexplored frontier.