The West African Ecosystem Score Card Assessment Project is led by the Institute for Rural Development and Innovation Studies at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Ghana. It seeks to develop a rigorous analytical framework, innovative scorecard methodologies, and robust empirical assessment of contemporary Research and Development ecosystems in West Africa.
The project will devise a composite scorecard methodology for Ghana, Nigeria, and Senegal. The bilingual scorecards will offer an easy-to-understand, intuitive, and robust overview of the ‘health/performance’ of R&D ecosystems in these countries, help understand critical components of an enabling environment for R&D, and identify key constraints to support domestic and regional policy advocacy actors (including donors) that seek to enhance such ecosystems. The methodology and the scorecard will be designed in a way that allows for cross-country comparison. The project applies this methodology to conduct three deep dives into – and present scorecards for – distinct economic sectors of importance within national/regional R&D ecosystems. The deep dive applications of the scorecard will be applied to different aspects of the R&D ecosystem, focusing on the fields of vaccines (Nigeria, Ghana, and Senegal) as well as regenerative agriculture (Ghana, Nigeria, and Senegal).
The project involves research teams in Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal, and the UK. This equitable partnership will be thoroughly guided by a co-design and an integrated knowledge translation approach throughout its lifecycle, closely involving R&D ecosystem stakeholders in the development, design, testing, sense-making, and application of the scorecard methodology. It covers key evidence producers, evidence users, and evidence intermediaries in the West African R&D ecosystem. This will enhance the validity, acceptance, use, and uptake of the scorecard and its findings in policy advocacy processes that seek to enhance R&D ecosystems. The project will identify a set of recommendations to inform (post-project) activities (e.g., info sessions, trainings, short courses, research, and community engagement tools) that can build on the findings and strengthen regional and national R&D ecosystems.
Kindly access the various country scorecards below: