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The President
Madam Speaker
Comrades and Colleagues

It is a great pleasure and privilege to address you today on some key aspects of the science and technology. I would like to begin by thanking Minister Brigitte Mabandla who drove the actions leading to the launch of the South African Reference Group on Women in Science and Technology on 7 March this year, with the support of our Minister, Dr Ben Ngubane. This initiative, which she championed, highlights the ongoing challenge of making science and technology more applicable and accessible to the women of our nation.

At its first meeting, the Reference Group noted the ongoing disparities that women are significantly underrepresented in the science, engineering and technology workforce, that there are significant barriers to advancement and very few specific measures in place to ensure a level playing field.

The recommendations made by the reference group include:

* Professional councils, academics, parastatals and the private sector should develop a resource, which illustrate clearly the career paths available to women in the field of Science and Technology. This information should be compiled in an accessible and practical way and the targets should include: Girls in School, Parents and teachers.
* This can be encouraged by further promoting and profiling successful role models who are able to promote Science and Technology to this audience through the media and personal appearances.

During this financial year, the Department of Science and Technology will investigate the extent to which the research portfolios of our science councils are informed by gender perspectives. This review will allow us to design and initiate actions to sensitise research and innovation managers to mainstream gender issues in constructing research and development programmes.

Many children make their career choices in their schooling years. Early influences and cultural assumptions often lead the girl child to select subjects other than mathematics and science. Concerted efforts need to be made to address this.

Science and technology does indeed make a massive contribution in our society, but we should continue to reflect on how its contribution can be increased and how its positive outcomes can be more widely shared.

The Department of Science and Technology, among other things, concentrates its efforts on the "after-school activities" of our learners - that is the time available outside the teaching of the core curriculum. The Department will hold a National Science Week in May this year to promote the development of arts, mathematics and science as an extra curriculum activity.

In respect of arts and science centres, I am very pleased to announce that the Department has recently made capital grants for infrastructure investment and development to the Universities of Zululand, Venda and Potchefstroom. We hope that Treasury could review the infrastructure investment programme, which was the source of funding for the above universities for the other institutions to benefit.

We are also participating in development initiatives for the Gauteng Department of Education's Newtown Science Centre and we are aware of, and will partner with, a number of other activities undertaken by provinces to create these facilities. Our partnerships will ensure that there is a good sharing of knowledge, experience and resources between these centres as they represent important nodes where our learners can engage positively with science and technology.

The area of skills development needs ongoing attention. The Advanced Manufacturing Technology Strategy referred to by the Minister emphasises the need to strengthen skills at all levels. In the manufacturing arena, it is often difficult for small, medium and micro enterprises to have access to technology and skills. The Tshumisano Technology Stations have established seven centres that operate in the following fields:

* Electronics and electrical engineering
* Product development and rapid prototyping of metal products
* Chemicals and chemical products
* Composite materials
* Automotive components, and
* Textiles and clothing.

With the increased financing sourced through the National Research and Development Strategy, we intend to extend the range and scope of these activities. The Technology Stations serve disadvantaged communities and Small, Medium and Micro enterprises by linking them to the knowledge and capacities of our technikons. The Programme has had a number of early successes such as improving the soap-making technology of a black entrepreneur, Ms Motlalepule Moroeng resulting in improved quality, which has enabled her to secure provincial contracts in the North West Government; She also won a contract to supply her products to the World Cricket Cup.

In addition, outreach work in townships has shown that there are many entrepreneurs involved in the technological development who have developed very innovative skills. For instance, 65 Small Scale Copper Miners in the Northern Cape have been trained in developing value added products. This has resulted in the increased production and sales of Nana Sun copper Art and wall hangings, bowls, jug, dishes and kettles and 40 new jobs were created.

Furthermore, since our democratic dispensation in 1994, our country has once more made a major breakthrough in the area of Indigenous Knowledge System. As widely publicised, this is illustrated by the agreement signed between CSIR and San Community regarding royalties and related percentages of benefit sharing. This is part of the indigenous knowledge that the Indigenous Knowledge Systems Bill is meant to protect.

The field of international relations in science and technology underwent further development in the last year. In the area of multilateral relations the first NEPAD workshop on science and technology took place in Johannesburg with participation from the initiating countries and a number of multilateral agencies. This workshop has crafted clear and practical steps to ensure the mainstreaming of science and technology in the NEPAD process and programme. The Johannesburg Plan of Action of the World Summit on Sustainable Development has recognised far more strongly than before the importance of research, science and technology in sustainable development and the eradication of poverty.

Actions are being taken to ensure that this critical contribution is realised. Most recently, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development Committee on Science and Technology Policy, where South Africa has observer status, has agreed to take a Declaration on Science and Technology and Sustainable Development to its next Ministerial meeting in January 2004. This follows the Dubai Declaration on Science and Technology, the first by the G77 in November and the Cape Town Declaration adopted by Ministers of the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries, chaired by Minister Ngubane and addressed by Deputy President Jacob Zuma in July last year.

A few years ago, before the Internet bubble, economists used to talk about "sunset industries". In a number of countries there has been an active process of the renewal of these industries, led by effective partnerships between industry and government. This has also started in South Africa with programmes such as Coaltech 2020 where the mining industry, the National Research Foundation, and research organisations, universities and technikons collaborate to make our coal industry more productive and sustainable. This will ensure that more jobs are created and sustained.

We need many similar initiatives in our resource-based industries and government must play its part in building research and development capacities to support these industry changes.

A particular initiative is the provision of a policy and model for the proposed National Energy Research Institute, requested by Cabinet. This process will be finalised in late May for presentation to Cabinet in June.

We recognise the special challenges of communication about science and technology to our people. All societies face this challenge, but we have in addition a legacy of exclusion and the abuse of public resources that has led to great suspicion about science and technology. We will therefore continue to strengthen the public processes of communication. This has been assisted by the incorporation of the Foundation for Education, Science and Technology (FEST) in the National Research Foundation. It will allow better use of resources, create new synergies and ensure more effective integration of these programmes.

As our partnerships have strengthened across government other realignments have become possible. The CSIR is in the process of becoming a line institution of the Department of Science and Technology, because of the broad and crosscutting nature of its contributions in research and innovation in our society. This Department will shortly be in a position to take over the research activities of the South African Antarctic and islands programmes and will deploy additional resources to strengthen these. Our geographic advantage allows for this.

Information technology remains high on the agenda for our Department. Following the policy work concluded in the area of Open Source Software and computing there have been positive moves in Government and SITA to support a more open computer environment.

In addition the Department of Science and Technology is launching, with the CSIR, an Open Source Resources Centre, which will target key areas in the national interest and support a growing community of IT practitioners who use an open source approach to development of software.

These changes, and the broader progress outlined above would not be possible without positive and deepening partnerships with other Departments and agencies across government.

I would like to conclude my remarks by saying that Science and Technology affects all of us and contributes to our quality of life daily - better communications, new health care possibilities, new educational techniques, better and safer food, clean water, more effective policing, not to mention economic growth.

We bring this potential to life through partnership and we also celebrate our partners and their achievements. Clearly South Africa has made remarkable strides in harnessing and ensuring equitable access to Science and Technology. However, we still face many challenges for the coming financial year and beyond. Therefore it becomes the responsibility of all of us in government, in private sector, civil society and the broader community.

I thank you.

Source: Department of Science and Technology (http://www.dst.gov.za)