Critical role universities in Africa should play in innovation for economic growth and development

Abstract

This paper examines the critical role universities in Africa ought to play in innovation in support of economic growth and development. The prime motivation for this paper is to propose ways universities can support economic growth and development through innovation initiatives in their operations. Innovation involves the generation of a creative idea or insight: the insight must be put into action to make a genuine difference in economic growth and development. There are a wide range of approaches to conceptualizing innovation in the scholarly literature. Innovation can be looked at from the context of technology, commerce, social system, economic development, and policy construction. Information for this research was obtained from both primary and secondary data. Primary data was obtained from knowledgeable individuals in terms of what they considered to be the role of the modern African university in innovation for economic growth and development. However, the paper relied more on secondary data sources available in the internet (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innovation). The key finding is that universities in Africa have an important role to play in innovation but must change their modus operandi in terms of curriculum development, teaching and assessment of student learning among others in order to remain relevant to the needs of the modern economy.