By Iddi Yire
Accra, June 16, GNA – President John Dramani Mahama has unveiled the Ghana National Research Fund as part of efforts to accelerate Ghana’s journey towards becoming a knowledge-driven, innovation-led and globally competitive economy.
The President also announced at the launch of the Fund in Accra, a GH¢100 million seed money for the Fund for the year 2026.
The President said the initial investment of the GH¢100 million would support competitive national research grants, doctoral and post-doctoral research programmes, digital grants management systems, strategic innovation initiatives and priority research programmes that were aligned with national development objectives.
This allocation, he reiterated, reflects the government’s commitment to building a sustainable and credible national research finance ecosystem.
He said in addition, the government would ensure the full, and timely implementation of the provisions of Act 1056 on the mobilisation and release of resources for research funding.
He charged the Ministry of Education in collaboration with the GETFund and the Fund Governing Board to ensure the transparent, accountable and resource-orientated deployments of these resources.
The President said by operationalising the Fund, Ghana was making a deliberate policy choice to place research, innovation, and knowledge generation at the heart of our development agenda.
“We got together not merely to launch a fund. We got to make a national declaration that knowledge, science, and innovation matter and that Ghana is prepared to invest in all these three strategic things as instruments of national transformation,” President Mahama stated.
He added: “This is not simply the inauguration of another statutory institution. It establishes a national framework for financing knowledge creation, strengthening scientific capability, and aligning research more closely with our national development priorities.
The President said today, Ghana affirms that research could no longer be treated as a peripheral activity; adding that it might become one of the engines that drive the nation’s economic growth, social progress, and national competitiveness.
He said this moment must also be understood within the broader history of Ghana’s development.
President Mahama said from the earliest years of nation’s independence, the founding President, Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah recognised that science, technology, and research would be indispensable to economic transformation and national self-reliance. He noted that Dr Nkrumah understood that a nation seeking to industrialise could not indefinitely rely on important knowledge and solutions and that Ghana had to build the capacity to generate its own idea, develop its own technologies, and solve its own local challenges.
He reiterated that Dr Nkrumah’s vision was simple yet profound.
President Mahama said Ghana must not only consume knowledge, but Ghana must also produce knowledge that was locally relevant.
He said President Nkrumah recognised that research could not be incidental to development; adding that it had to be deliberately organised as part of statecraft.
President Mahama said many decades later, President Professor John Evans Atta Mills reaffirmed the importance of science, technology, innovation, and research as a pillar of Ghana’s development agenda and championed stronger institutional support for research and knowledge generation.
“Indeed, the Ghana National Research Fund vision was a central dream of Professor John Evans Atta Mills. And on this day, we acknowledge him and remember him, that his vision has come to fruition,” the President said.
“So this vision has always been present. What has often been missing is the predictable, sustainable financing architecture needed to support that vision”
Adding that that architecture came in Act 1056 of 2020.
President Mahama acknowledged the previous administration of Nana Akufo-Addo for piloting it through Parliament and passing and ascending to Act 1056.
He said in the 21st century, nations could no longer compete solely on the basis of natural resources, geographical advantage, or access to capital; declaring that nations must compete on ideas, innovation and the ability to transform knowledge into productivity, and productivity into prosperity for their people.
The President said the most successful economies in the world today are not necessarily those that are endowed with greatest natural wealth.
Adding that they were the economies that had consistently invested in research, technology, innovation, and human capital development.
He said the Fund’s mission-based framework reflects a clear understanding that research investments must be directed towards the areas that are most critical to Ghana’s development.
“Ghanaian farmers and agriculturists are looking for research that will save them from the scourge of the army worm in maize production,” the President said.
“Ghanaian farmers, cocoa farmers, are looking to research that will develop species of cocoa that are resistant to the swollen shoot disease.”
President Mahama said the University Teachers Association (UTAG) will be happy to have Ghana National Research Fund as the supplementary research fund in addition to their research and book allowances
President Mahama commended Professor Eric Yirenkye Danquah, the Chairman of the Governing Board of the Ghana National Research Fund for spearheading the implementation of the Fund.
Mr Haruna Iddrisu, the Minister of Education, announced that the Ministry in collaboration with the Finance Ministry in collaboration were taking steps to address the research and book allowances issue of UTAG, hence there was no need for them to embark on strike.
GNA
Edited by Benjamin Mensah