Makerere University and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) signed an Agreement on Continued Research Cooperation on 18th February 2010. Phase III of the agreement slated for the four-year period starting January 2010 to June 2014 will be worth 180million SEK or USD 25.7million.

Makerere University and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) signed an Agreement on Continued Research Cooperation on 18th February 2010. Phase III of the agreement slated for the four-year period starting January 2010 to June 2014 will be worth 180million SEK or USD 25.7million.

The Director, School of Graduate Studies, Prof. Eli Katunguka Rwakishaya expressed gratitude at witnessing the signing of yet another agreement for continued research support, which started in 2000. He thanked the Government and people of Sweden for the previous phases of support valued at 300million SEK or USD 37.5million, which saw the strengthening of Makerere’s position as leading provider of Science education and research; Improvement of the quality of academic staff and graduates through PhD training and reduction of the degree of brain drain. He pledged that at the end of the 4 year period, Makerere was committed to have; increased the use of research outputs, technologies and innovations to contribute to national development; increased its Capacity to undertake research, generate and use new knowledge; and created an enabling environment for carrying out quality research.

Dr. Christina de Carvalho, Policy Specialist, Research, Sida Team Uganda, who was instrumental in providing valuable input for Phase III extension thanked Prof. Katunguka and the Makerere team, for their successful completion of previous phases. She lauded the Swedish Government for increasing the funding for Phase III, which will witness three more academic units namely; The Faculty of Arts, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and the Quality Assurance Directorate come on board.

The Acting Vice-Chancellor Prof. Venansius Baryamureeba thanked Sida for the long term support to projects, which has indeed established Sida as partner in Makerere’s adage to build for the future. He indeed appreciated the benefits Makerere has reaped thus far such as; the Campus-wide fiber optic backbone; the improved gender terrain due to support accorded to the gender mainstreaming division and support to university efforts to reform administrative, financial, research, teaching and learning processes. Prof Baryamureeba further valued the support, which this time round also benefit the four other public universities in the area of PhD and Masters training.

In his address, the Swedish Ambassador to Uganda H.E. Andres Johnson, reiterated the importance of Research and innovations, which form the basis for Sweden’s exports “Globalisation creates more of interaction and interdependencies. As a small country, Sweden has to be internationally competitive – more than 50% of our GDP is based on exports.” In relation to Uganda “Consequently, the cooperation between Sweden and Uganda is a tangible manifestation of the importance we attach to the role of research in development” he added. He lauded Makerere’s efforts aimed at administrative reform to ensure the effective and efficient running of the university and commended the institution for becoming the highest-ranked university on research publications in East Africa, during the January webometric rankings.

The Minister of State for Primary Education, Dr. Kamanda Bataringaya, who represented the Minister of State for Higher Education Hon. Mwesigwa Rukutana, expressed Government’s deliberate support to strengthen Makerere’s research capacity through Sida/SAREC funded programs. This, he admitted was done due to the university being identified as “key institution in Uganda best positioned to make a strategic contribution to the overall research capacity in the country.” He noted some of the benefits of Sida’s support such as “the Demographic Surveillance Site at Iganga/Mayuge, the biochemistry lab in the College of Health Sciences, the GIS lab in the Faculty of Technology,” which benefit not only Makerere but server researchers across Uganda and the globe.

On behalf of government of Uganda, Hon. Bataringaya thanked the government and people of Sweden for their continued support to the government of Uganda and Makerere in particular in building research capacity.

Click here to view Hon. Bataringaya's full speech 

Click here to view H.E Ambassador Andres Johnson's full speech

Click here to view Prof. Katunguka-Rwakishaya's full speech