An Instrument for Measuring National Readiness and Capacity to Participate in Global Knowledge Base Economy

An important question often asked is what are the determinants of science, technology and innovation (STI)? Is STI a measurable quantity? How can it be measured in quantitative terms? To answers                                                          these questions, a Science, Technology and Innovation Index (STII) has been developed for top 100 economies of the world on the basis of GDP, to evaluate, determine and measure the overall scientific, technological and innovative capacity and readiness of a country. The STII relies on four dimensions, each built around two or three pillars, each of which is composed of individual indicators, for a total of 44 STI indicators. The STI index is the average of aggregate of four dimensions. The economies are ranked on the basis of STII values and classified into six groups: i.e. leaders, potential leaders, dynamic adopters, slow adopters, marginalized and laggards. For more meaningful assessment of the STI capacities of nations, it captures the achievement gap of individual countries with the highest achiever. A comprehensive analysis into the strengths and weaknesses in different dimensions of STI capability of eight East - South Asian countries is also provided. The results show that there are significant dispari¬ties between developed and developing nations in STI capacity and its various aspects. STI capacity and achievement gap analysis of individual countries provides useful information for STI policy makers to furnish their STI policies for increasing national capacity, and readiness to participate in the knowledge based economy

Science, technology and innovation composite indicators for developing countries

This thesis aims to propose a policy-relevant science, technology and innovation indicator for developing countries. I firstly develop a model to examine the determination of innovativeness for a sample of 38 developing countries, based on endogenous growth theory and innovation systems literature. From econometric estimation, I find that R&D inputs, technology imports, and international connectedness are influential determinants of innovativeness in these countries. From this finding, I develop the Predicted Innovativeness Index for Developing Countries (INNÔDEX), a composite indicator that ranks countries according to their innovative capabilities.M.S.Committee Chair: Cozzens, Susan; Committee Member: Porter, Alan; Committee Member: Walsh, Joh

Locating Ethics: capacity building, ethics review and research governance across Asia

Research ethics has become integrated into what it means to conduct good science. This thesis is about the nature of that integration, which I argue is not neutral, carrying with it ideas of duty, moral obligations, organisational mechanisms, and processes of monitoring. For developing countries to participate in global research, the pre-requisite of ethical review has necessitated a growth in capacity building exercises. The chapters aim to elucidate ethnographically the activities and implications of 'capacity building' activities in biomedical research ethics, through following the trainings, assessments and networking of the Forum of Ethics Review Committees of Asia and the Pacific (FERCAP), a Non-Governmental Organisation. The work provides a critical reflection on the spread and uptake of ethics, contributing particularly to literatures in medical anthropology, organisational studies, and development anthropology. Drawing on material from ethnographic fieldwork with the NGO in Sri Lanka, Thailand, the Philippines, Taiwan and mainland China over 12 months between March 2009 and November 2010, it advances an argument that the uptake of ethics through forms such as the Ethics Review Committee implicates social relations in new forms of management, with the moralities assumed to be part of ethics attaching to varied understandings of obligation, accountability, trust and personhood. Central to the analysis is the exploration of the co-existence of standardisation with practices of differentiation within the activities of FERCAP, a tension explored through a theoretical framework informed by attention to fractal imageries replicated across the settings of research

Factors influencing the successful adoption of technopreneurship in the food processing sector in Zimbabwe.

Doctor of Philosophy in Management Studies. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 2015.Technopreneurship has been found to be one of the modern approaches to lead economic development in such success stories like the Asian upcoming economies. From such a background, the study endeavoured to determine the factors which influence technopreneurship in such a developing nation as Zimbabwe. From theory and practice, technopreneurship is found to be the key to knowledge-based economies that can assist most developing countries that may struggle to industrialise. Zimbabwe as an economy is well positioned to produce food products for the domestic and other regional and international economies. The objectives of the study were: to examine factors that influence the adoption of technopreneurship in the food processing sector in Zimbabwe; to assess the importance given to technopreneurship by the food processing sector in Zimbabwe; to examine the feasibility of technopreneurship, and to test the relationship between factors that influence technopreneurship in the food processing sector in Zimbabwe. Current literature on technopreneurship addresses issues in developed countries and success stories of other upcoming economies like India and China. The study contributed to the context of technopreneurship in developing countries and especially in sub-Saharan Africa. The issues of a lack of development in such nations like Zimbabwe which may have natural endowments and what could be seen as good economic policies were addressed. A model of a technopreneurship system was proposed to contextualise the Zimbabwean technopreneurship situation and this could apply to most regional and global situations. The research onion was adopted to guide the research methodology and methods. The positivist research philosophy and a quantitative research approach were adopted to gather data through a questionnaire from the major industrial food processing technopreneurs in Harare. Nine companies were contacted to get a final sample of 147 respondents who included management, administrative and technical staff. SPSS was used for data management and quantitative data analysis techniques which included descriptive and inferential statistics adopted. Findings suggest that technopreneurship plays an important developmental role in the food processing sector and while several factors influenced technopreneurship such as internal processes; human factors; global factors; venture capital; partnerships, and government support was found to be the most important factor influencing all other factors. The major and determining factor influencing technopreneurship in the industrial food processing factor in Zimbabwe was Government support. A contribution to new knowledge and respective stakeholders in technopreneurship was made