Agenda Knowledge for Development

Patricia Mweene Lumba

Sustainable Development, Senior Knowledge Management Officer at African Union Interafrican Bureau for Animal Resources (AU-IBAR)

Optimising the Africa Knowledge Agenda for the Knowledge Society

Effective participation in the “Knowledge Society” requires, rather obviously, access to its most important commodity, knowledge (Elder, et.al: 2013). If well managed, data and information can be a catalyst to Africa’s international arena involvement. To be a true leader in the international field, Africa will need to reconsider what it means to be engaged in the current knowledge economy. A starting point is to remind ourselves what it takes to participate in the Knowledge Society. According to UNESCO (2013), Knowledge Societies are not built only on technology or information. Besides, Knowledge Societies are achievements of human development, made upon a combination of social values, technology, and innovation, in which essential roles are played by quality education for all, cultural diversity, and universal access to information, and community participation.Adopting a holistic approach can provide better participation in the knowledge society and should be encouraged by government and organisation procedures and bolstered by knowledge, networking, and technology and innovation to increase the quality of life for all Africans. The role of Knowledge Management in enhancing agility is justifiable in meeting the African Union (AU) Vision of ‘An Integrated, Prosperous, and Peaceful Africa, driven by its citizens and representing a dynamic force in the International arena.” However, several factors influence Africa’s Knowledge Agenda in playing a meaningful role in the knowledge society that requires closer attention before we get there. The remainder of this article examines Africa’s knowledge access gap and identifies some priority actions to enhancing the Africa Knowledge Agenda in the Knowledge Society.Re-examining the Access GapThe Right to Information (RTI) has been a critical element of sustainable development since the 1992 Rio Declaration (Article 19, 2017). The tracking, monitoring, and reporting on implementation progress towards achieving these goals and targets is an important mechanism to ensure that political will, backed by appropriate actions, to achieve development and transformation on the African continent. The reality is that although the Right to Information has been a recognised need, marginalised citizens often do not have full access to development information (Bentley & Chib, 2017).For instance, the right to information is often credited to well-resourced actors that can compile, manage and mine data, and not to the farmers who play critical roles as both the source providers and data users, further depriving less powerful actors of the little influence they possess (De Beer 2016). There is a need for well-developed Open Science systems for Africa to maximize information for decision making (FAO, 2020; Mwelwa et. al., 2020; 8).The availability of open government data has shown the potential to contribute to public liability and economic and sustainable development (Magalhaes, Roseira, & Strover, 2013). However, there is more room for Governments and other stakeholders to increase the publication of open data, especially data related to vulnerable groups, and ensure that this data contributes effectively to improving lives. Support can also help relevant non-governmental organizations analyse and use open data to improve the situation and adapt existing practices and processes to impact the poorest and most vulnerable positively.Publishing open data online can help ensure higher degrees of accountability and transparency of national governments, which play an essential role in developing development agendas (WorldBank, 2015).  The translation and dissemination of scientific information through traditionally-relevant means, such as local media, can ensure public access to crucial data.Linked to the RTI, access to technology has been a big influence to Africa’s participation in the Knowledge society. The well-documented “digital divide” is still prevalent between north and south, rich and poor, or between urban and rural populations. The past years have seen a glimmer of hope for what technology can do in Africa, particularly in the increased use of mobile devices (e.g. Beza, et. al. 2017; Staal, et. al., 2020).The use of appropriate technology has soared to new heights with the promise of narrowing the digital divide by the relatively rapid diffusion of mobile technologies and social media platforms deployed in African countries. However, unlocking these technologies’ development potential implies overcoming other multiple barriers to meaningful information access, such as skills development, cost-effective internet connectivity, sufficient and sustainable financial resources to ensure knowledge brokers remain content providers and relevant and timely local content. Outside the scope of government services for monitoring policy implementation, there is a greater need to engage other partners from the private sector, civil society, academia, donors, and multilateral agencies as knowledge brokers. SDG implementation requires innovative knowledge brokering practice with greater prominence on brokering knowledge between various organisational and societal actors (Cummings, et.al. 2018). Bringing together the right partners provides scope for better data analysis and required solutions and ensures data and information access and application by relevant stakeholders.For instance, governments could strengthen partnerships with the private sector and other stakeholders to find answers and feedback mechanisms in the data collection and verification process of information from citizens (Gurin, et. al., 2020). However, there is a need for applicable legal and policy frameworks to be in place to strengthen citizen science for decision making (Kulk & Loenen, 2012), including end-user capacity strengthening and awareness on information management practices (Schaap, et.al. 2020). The need for acceptable data management practices to support decision making and policy processes is a critical need for the continent. The current situation points to inconsistent data from diverse sources, unreliable or weak approaches for disseminating information, and inadequate communication between different stakeholders; insufficient capacity to interpret and analyze data has also hampered data information for sustainable development (AU-IBAR, 2018). While access to technology, data, and information is necessary, these stand-alone models are ineffective in providing a full-fledged knowledge management solution. Society is embedding itself into more areas such as partnerships and networking, Local Knowledge access, innovation, Openness models, data management, and the capacity to communicate as core elements of sustainable development. Knowledge Management solutions have been useful when there is a combination of codification and personalisation strategies (Hansen et al., 1999).These are also the building blocks and core outputs of the networked environments that the Africa Knowledge Agenda could prioritize. If African has to play an equal partner in the international development sector, these open models that support both codification and personalisation are worth exploring as catalysts to Open DevelopmentThere is a need for Africa to explore how these models and initiatives can contribute to social and economic gains for African countries; how the value of innovation, formerly bottled up within individuals and institutions, can be more broadly dispersed; and how developing country entrepreneurs and the private sector can use open knowledge business models to the greatest benefit. A strong commitment to empirical research methods is essential to ensure these models’ credibility and, more importantly, real, local impact.Several writers have highlighted the existing knowledge access gaps to barriers to implementing development agendas: the SDG Agenda 2030 and the African Union Agenda 2063 (e.g., Barrantes & Santos, 2019; Wu, Lo & Ng, 2019). The lack of detailed or existing data and information management plans presents a problem in providing a baseline for future assessments over the SDGs’ lifetime and the closely linked Africa Agenda 2063.Priority Actions to enhancing Africa’s participation in the Knowledge SocietyBased on the challenges identified, the Africa Knowledge Agenda’s vision should maximize the generation and use of local data and sustainable development knowledge.  The new Knowledge Management era should challenge information specialists to reinvent and reposition themselves as infomediaries that can efficiently manage processes of converting data and information into knowledge for development (Mchombu, 2007). The mission for the professionals concerned with the African Knowledge Agenda would be to create a network of African Knowledge workers empowered to create, access, and use evidence-based local knowledge to enable multi-sectoral stakeholders in Africa to contribute to sustainable development policymaking. Specific priority actions could positively influence the Africa Knowledge Agenda. These include, but are not limited to:• Developing methodologies around access to decision support data and information by linking best practice and knowledge to policies and programs and using these to trigger and monitor changes at country, regional and continental level;• Promoting peer to peer and multi-sector stakeholder experience sharing and learning, benchmarking of best practices, north-south knowledge exchanges, and scaling-up awareness and piloting of successful Knowledge Management initiatives;• Improving the efficiency of SDG related data entry by national governments through user-friendly interfaces and allow other data users at Regional Economic Communities and the Africa Union Commission to instantaneously review, validate, and provide feedback on the data;•           Strengthening country and local level data and information management systems to reinforce Africa’s engagement in continental and global development initiatives and to report on progress (e.g., trade, agriculture, education, health);• Strengthening data and information sharing between information systems by providing solutions in content syndication;
• Building capacity among end-users, particularly marginalized, to understand and work with information and knowledge for sustainable development policymaking efforts. 
Towards a unified AfricaAfrica is a diverse continent, with levels of information access models differing from sector to sector and country to country. A common longing for societies is to ensure that knowledge is a typical good driving the necessary economic development (Cribb & Sari, 2010: 17; Ostrom, 2006). The belief in a universal bond of sharing what connects all humanity also referred to as ‘Ubuntu’ is practically useless if an integrated goal for knowledge sharing is not part of Africa’s vision.   Strengthening social networks among Knowledge Management professionals on the continent and beyond will allow for coordinated new solutions outside of each sector’s and country’s framework. Knowledge Management professionals are ideal champions that can foster an emerging set of open knowledge initiatives. In conclusion, to be effective in its contribution to the knowledge society, the Africa Knowledge Agenda can benefit the continent by leaning towards localized Knowledge Management solutions that promote: digitally-enabled user-friendly and cost-effective information platforms, sharing ideas on best practice, strengthening initiatives to reuse, revise, repurpose syndicated content, increasing the transparency of processes, and expanding stakeholder participation and collaborative as a means of implementing the SDGs.

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Leif Edvinsson

Professor, University of Lund, Sweden

Future knowledge societies are in an accelerating, exponential dynamic. Is it chaos or is there an intelligence pattern to be observed? An emerging approach was shared by the founder of VISA, Dee W. Hock, who labelled this evolution ‘Birth of the chaordic age’, based on his experiences from developing the global networked enterprise, VISA. I started to see this as a knowledge navigation system, with focus on position, direction and speed. And some decades ago, we developed the holistic platform, the Skandia Navigator, which captures 7 perspectives, namely five times broader intelligence horizons than the traditional financial economy focus. The origin of this vision is to be found in the tree metaphor, emerging from inspiration of the Asian perspective on knowledge. The tree with its roots representing the flow of knowledge in an ecosystem. And the power focus on the roots to be nourished bottom up for future fruits.

Today, the economy is more and more intangibles. One distinction is the Intellectual Capital (IC) as the derived insights of ‘head’ value for future earning capabilities. This might be mapped as National IC (NIC). Today, we have a unique database with some 60 countries, and more than 48 systematized indicators, showing the evolution over some decades. The pattern is clear: the Nordic countries, USA and Singapore are at the top. Around 70% of the GDP formation in Sweden is dependent on NIC. How sustainable will this position be? For national knowledge performance, it is essential to address the investment efficiency of knowledge and knowledge productivity. The renewal dimensions have a major impact. The Knowledge Agenda has to address the whole spectrum of IC beyond Industry 4.0 to grasp the new Triple Bottom Line: economic, cultural and experiential value. In today’s economy, it is becoming obvious that so-called knowledge economy is a quest for a better system. The action needed reflects Leonardo da Vinci’s motto: learning to see.  

Kingo Mchombu

Professor and Acting Vice Chancellor, International University of Management, Namibia 

The Agenda of Knowledge for Development 2030 supports the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 through strengthening knowledge systems and services throughout the world. Coincidentally, Namibia’s Vision 2030 envisions this country to have become knowledge based society by the year 2030.  Since the mid-1990 when the World Bank Human Development Report, subtitled Knowledge for Development, was launched, many Knowledge for Development projects and programmes have taken place. Most of the activities have been at the UN Agencies, international agencies and some at individual country level.  

For knowledge for development to be beneficial to the people of Namibia, knowledge acquisition and development action must form one continuum, knowledge without action is of little use.  A paradoxical station in Namibia is the fact that although Namibia is categorized as an upper middle income country, slightly over 35% of the population survives below the poverty line and income inequality is among the highest in the world. The gross income disparities originate from the historical circumstances of Namibia which became a colony of Nazi Germany and Apartheid South Africa in quick succession. Both these brutal colonizers disposed black Africans of fertile land, livestock and property. Apartheid also provided inferior education called Bantu education. 

Knowledge for development could thus start by looking at how to improve the delivery of education at primary school and secondary school for the majority of people who cannot afford private education. The outcome of education to the low income  is very poor, with a low pass rate and  below 30% of school leavers obtain university entrance grades, the rest have to go back to repeat the same grades or join the ranks of unemployed youth. Despite the poor grade 12 results some schools from the most deprived areas have produced some of the best examinations pass rates annually. The challenge of harnessing knowledge for development would be for teachers from poorly performing schools to learn from best performing schools as a way to improve the education system of Namibia.

Namibia produces some of the best meat in the world marketed to the EU, China, and the USA to mention a few places. Yet this economic opportunity has eluded the majority communal farmers because of the alleged poor quality of livestock keeping, as they raise livestock the cultural way, herd size being valued above the quality of animals. There is therefore huge economic potential to provide systematic transfer of knowledge from commercial livestock keepers to communal farmers to improve the quality of their animals to benefit from the lucrative international markets. Already the state owned MEATCO Namibia is running a small scale project for commercial farmers who are mostly white to mentor communal farmers who are mostly black, thus improving both the communal economy and also interracial relations.

Namibia has several ethnic groups with their ancient knowledge still largely intact, as westernization has not eroded their way of living and these include the San, the Himba, and Ovatwa.  Their valuable indigenous knowledge is not systematically tapped unless there is an anticipated commercial value. Knowledge for development would provide a platform to systematically and holistically harvest this indigenous knowledge while empowering the communities to be part of the development process in the country, without losing their cultural heritage and identify.  

Namibia being a drought prone country and rich in wild animal resources has developed in vast knowledge resources in mitigating drought conditions and wild game farming as a commercial activity. Such knowledge would be useful in other parts of the world where similar problems are frequently encountered.

Dr. Bambang Susantono

Vice-President of Knowledge Management and Sustainable Development
Asian Development Bank (ADB)

Knowledge Management is fundamental to all aspects of development work and ultimately to the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It is a powerful way of adding real value to our support for countries as they strive to attain the SDGs. In Asia and the Pacific, many countries have reached middle-income status. Nevertheless, there are persistent challenges blocking the path to inclusive, green, and sustainable growth. The size and complexity of these challenges are increasingly daunting in a world still grappling with the pandemic, unprecedented digital transformation, and worsening climate change.

None of us can afford to take a business-as-usual approach. We need to continuously innovate and mobilize all our knowledge to promote development. At the Asian Development Bank (ADB), we know that knowledge management is not a stand-alone process. It is part of a bigger strategy to promote innovation, transform organizational culture to share knowledge and expertise more openly, and empower and invest in people.

That is why our new Knowledge Management Action Plan (KMAP), 2021-2025 brings together these institutional reform initiatives as part and parcel of ADB’s knowledge management approach. In this context, it is important to remember that knowledge-sharing does not stop within the organization, but should expand across our developing members, development partners, and the broad spectrum of stakeholders with whom we share the common goal of attaining the SDGs. This kind of knowledge management allows us not only to harness knowledge effectively but to offer evidence-based solutions to the development challenges that our members are facing. We aspire to become a “knowledge solutions bank” through implementing the KMAP, 2021-2025.

To guide ADB’s approach to knowledge management I have coined the phrase “3Ds of Knowledge for Development” which stands for “Deploy, Demonstrate, and Disseminate”. We are committed to generating high quality knowledge and then deploying it in the field; demonstrating how it offers viable solutions to concrete problems; and then widely disseminating the lessons learned. By taking this approach, we can adapt knowledge to the local context. Each step of these 3Ds requires that new technology and innovations are harnessed, and effective partnerships are forged. None of us alone can achieve the impact needed for the SDGs, but together we can make a difference through effective knowledge management. The Knowledge for Development Partnership (K4DP) is an exciting opportunity for us all to join hands in this common aspiration.

Mamun Rashid

Managing Partner PricewaterhouseCoopers, Bangladesh

The concept of knowledge management is actually as old as the human civilization itself. There is no denying the fact that the generation, accumulation, sharing and utilization of knowledge has been the fuel that powered the advancement of mankind.
Modern day knowledge management (KM) refers to the structured process of creating, storing, protecting, using and sharing the knowledge and information of an entity. It is a multidisciplinary approach to achieving goals at the organizational, national and global level. Moreover, the rise in the volume of information in the 21st century has made organizations and governments in every country refocus on the importance of knowledge management. Even, in a developing nation like Bangladesh, efforts are being undertaken for improvement of knowledge generation, storage, protection and utilization processes in both private and public sector.
The United Nations puts emphasis on an appropriate knowledge management strategy for achieving its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) especially, in terms of localizing the SDGs, enhancing knowledge sharing and learning opportunities and promoting understanding, goodwill and support. The enhanced knowledge sharing, and promotion of goodwill can particularly work as a strong base for revitalizing global partnership for sustainable development which is the goal 17 of SDGs.
Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic has further reinstated the need for global cooperation in terms of finding a cure or antidote for the virus that has put the world in a great pause. This again necessitates an appropriate knowledge management framework that systematically accumulates the findings at the global level and creates a collective intelligence to the benefit of the whole world. 

Syed Ishtiaque Reza

Editor in Chief, GTV

Bangladesh economy has experienced tremendous growth in some selected industries such as readymade garment, leather, food-processing and service sector like information technology over the last two decades. The country also made considerable progress on reducing extreme poverty measured by 1.9 USD per day. Other six goals of SDG – end hunger, health for all, quality education for all, gender equality and women’s empowerment and drinking water and sanitation for all are highly challenging for Bangladesh. Since 1990s, when Bangladesh went for large scale market liberalization, Bangladesh’s media continued playing important role in raising awareness about the Sustainable Development. In today’s knowledge society, media people here are focusing well on some cross-cutting issues and drivers of development like knowledge-based sustained, inclusive and maintainable economic growth, decent jobs for all, resilient infrastructure, bearable industrialization, innovation and skill development and a long quest for a plural political system. To achieve all these targets, I believe the education system needed improvement in all stages where media has a role to play as change agents. 

Inam Ahmed

Editor
The Business Standard

Since SDG is a global collective commitment to make life better free of poverty, hunger and to establish equality, access to resources and better environment, the effort to achieve this is quite a lofty task especially in the backdrop of the covid-19 pandemic situation.
The pandemic has changed the world, perhaps for a very long time. And it will need special attention and global support achieve the SDG. For some of the countries, it may be a daunting task altogether.
This is where the need for a collective effort is all the more necessary to make up the losses that the pandemic might have caused on the actions for SDG.
A collective knowledge sharing is also of utmost importance at this juncture so that the best practices are known to all, so that a short circuiting the long process is known to all so that despite the pandemic’s chipping effect, the goals remain unchanged with the set deadline.
Democracy needs accountability and sharing of knowledge will lead to that democratization of SDG knowledge, the combination of which will lead to make possible a word free of poverty and hunger.

Syed Khaled Ahsan

The World Bank Office in Bangladesh

Knowledge and development are complementary to each other. The connotation of knowledge is broad in the context of development. There is a need for a culture to be patronized by the state and a habit by its citizens to live in a knowledge based society. In the time of deadly corona virus, it is more necessary than before. Perceptions, post-truth, cognitive bias all are very dominant now across the world. Scientific knowledge or quest for knowledge has lost it ground in a highly hostile environment. Who can outperform this epidemic of ignorance? It’s none other than a knowledge based society! Knowledge is truth, and it must show the humankind the right path for a solution. A good number of people are working in laboratories, hospital and academia to bring that knowledge to us. We are awaiting to see that the light of knowledge, sooner it will arrive there.  

Shahidul Alam

Photographer, writer, human rights activist. Time Magazine Person of the Year 2018.

The development lens has largely focused on basic needs. On the availability of material things. For our life to have meaning, we need more than merely the ability to survive. We need freedom, dignity and hope. We need to be able to plan for the future. Knowledge helps us attain material needs, but equally importantly, it gains us respect and an insight into our own destiny. It allows us to make informed choices, to choose the right path. It allows the governed to have a say in the process of governance. In a divided world, access to knowledge, provides a path to equality, the ultimate development goal. 

Ms. Shaheen Anam

Executive Director
Manusher Jonno Foundation

Manusher Jonno Foundation (MJF) formed a Knowledge Management Team (KMT) in April 2018 for gathering evidence on what works, what does not work and capture lesson learned from its programmes. KMT is also contributing to extract, capture, store and improve both internal and external knowledge to improve the organizational performance. MJF’s advocacy, communication and various programmatic works are now more visible, specific and effective. MJF’s internal decisions at all levels are better informed. External dialogues so far has contributed to generating public discourse around human rights and good governance issues.

KMT is also leading MJF’s SDG team and contributing in advocacy efforts with the Bangladesh government and CSOs. I understand that Vienna-based Knowledge for Development Partnership (K4DP) is taking the lead in implementing SDG 17 which calls for multi-stakeholder partnerships for sharing of knowledge and technology. I congratulate K4DP for developing Agenda Knowledge for Development and MJF would support its endeavor in providing a universal framework for the advancement of knowledge in societies.