Research

Khadiga Hassan The Department of Science and Innovation and the South African National Research Foundation (DSI/NRF) Trilateral Chair in Transformative Innovation, the 4IR and Sustainable...

The sharing economy has been growing at an ever-accelerating pace throughout the world as peer-to-peer networks and collaborative company models continue to pop up. The sharing economy, according to Rachel Botsman, is “an economic model based on sharing underutilized assets, from spaces to skills to stuff, for monetary or non-monetary benefits.” They often involve platforms that enable the exchange of services between peers or businesses. Arun Sundarajan explains the sharing economy somewhat differently: “What is new, in the “sharing economy,” is that you are not helping a friend for free; you are providing these services to a stranger for money.” He describes this as “crowd-based capitalism.”

The purpose of my visit was to seek the permission of the community members to conduct research in their community and to fix an appointment with the women. It was a short visit since I needed to introduce myself to the women and also brief them on the purpose of the visit.

By Outlwile Maselwanyane  The first gathering for Africa Open Science & Hardware (AfricaOSH) was hosted by Kumasi Hive innovation hub, Kumasi, Ghana, on April 13-15...

In my previous blog on skills development and innovation at Ghana’s Suame Magazine, I showed how the high level of collaboration and sharing of knowledge and skills within the cluster is contributing to innovation. Further, I provided some preliminary findings on the inability of these artisans’ to keep pace with the changing technology landscape. I also found that few artisans expressed interest in joining or maintaining a membership with local trade associations due to these associations’ inability to implement their key mandate of skills development and facilitation of business for members and firms.

This paper maps the 130-year history of the IP treaty landscape governing the protection of, and access to, knowledge in Africa.

Agricultural data is globally recognized for its importance in addressing food insecurity. We propose a ‘data commons’, formed through a licensing model that allows farmers to benefit from the datasets to which they contribute.

Is intellectual property (IP) gender neutral? No. Neither is the dominant discourse on innovation. Recognizing this bias is the first step toward remedying it.

This paper sets out findings from a national scan of maker collectives in South Africa. The scan gathered data on more than 20 maker communities across five South African provinces.

Authored by: Vipal Jain and Jeremy de Beer Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Biology, also known as biohacking, puts innovation into the hands of the citizens and provides...