Our Mandate
Capacity Enhancement
The capacity of academies is at the heart of NASAC activities because the network is only as strong as its weakest member. This means that resources have to be directed towards retooling, equipping and relearning how academies can better contribute to science, society and policy. Intranetworking is usually highly encouraged to avoid duplication of efforts and enhance institutional mentorship and sharing of resources. When opportunities arise to support research, then the focus is for continued collaboration of teams across several African countries and beyond disciplines through trans-disciplinarity. Inclusion of young scientists and gender considerations are also encourage as top agenda of any capacity enhancement activities at NASAC.
Convening Power
The ability to continually remain non-partisan has helped NASAC and its membership to retain their convening power. This is the ability to provide neutral platforms for dialogue for various stakeholders to address the most controversial of issues or pitch to the most antagonistic of actors in any given sector. The promotion of science diplomacy as a requisite skill for academies has also helped science to weigh in on geopolitical issues while still maintaining their independence. The confidence of issuing reports, statements or policy briefs on controversial topics has been supported by a track record of undertaking consensus studies that shed light on science as a public good aiming to uplift and benefit society.
Policy Advice
Research has shown that science for evidence-informed public policy relies on evidence synthesis that establishes the extent and limits of knowledge integrated across a broad range of disciplines at any given time. Through transdisciplinary research, an appreciation of citizen science and the inclusion of policy agents in scientific studies, NASAC has employed knowledge brokerage that seeks to support decision-makers in interpreting evidence, drawing conclusions, and implementing the needed actions. Until the COVID-19 pandemic, the influence of science in policymaking through appropriate formal structures had remained a challenge. This is now changing and efforts by NASAC have attempted to develop science advice systems that respond to specific institutional and sociocultural contexts for Africa. This has led to the development of a community of practice that uses diverse skillsets beyond science and attempt to deliver better communication of scientific facts devoid of jargon for purposes of interfacing science and policy.
Voice Of Science
NASAC sees science as both universal and a common good. This means that African scientists are capable of undertaking world-class science because there is no such thing as African Science – science is science regardless of geography. The subtle biases and nuances often lead to the exclusion of the voice of African scientists in various international forums. To overcome this, NASAC finds avenues and platforms that African experts can lend their voices and perspectives to critical global issues as a collective. This is done through international partnerships and collaborations that shape the global agenda. The collective voice of scientists in Africa can be heard through their academies when they contribute both knowledge and expertise in a significantly audible manner in global and regional decision-making forums.
Independence
NASAC is an independent consortium of merit-based science academies in Africa and believes that science can make in-roads in the policymaking arena and socio-economic spaces, especially with solution-oriented outputs or outcomes. To do this, NASAC employs honest brokerage rather than advocacy, which guarantees independence from the policymaking framework. The science advice that NASAC offers in the form of policy booklets, statements or reports, aims to facilitate evidence-informed policy. The trustworthiness of this science advice is embedded in NASAC’s mandate and looks at issues based on members’ input on thematic areas through panels of experts, who use of multiple sources of data and evidence. The advisory outputs are generated through an interactive and iterative process with various stakeholder and it acknowledges the knowledge gaps for further research.
