‘Academics can solve the country’s industry woes’

Lungile Tshuma
WHILE the nation is looking for the proper recipe to revive industry and the economy at large, academics have indicated that part of the solution lay in their hands.
Focus has been on funding issues while ignoring the part that the country’s institutions of higher learning can contribute and now academics feel proper co-ordination between industry and research can go a long way in solving problems besetting business.

Experts have pointed point out that there was a need for unity between academics and industry to synchronise ideas as a way of reviving industry.

Last week, academics from the country’s higher learning institutions and their counterparts in South Africa and Botswana met captains of industry and entrepreneurs at a conference in Victoria Falls with the goal of coming up with “innovations to help revive and propel industry”.

The meeting was organised by the National University of Science and Technology as its 6th International Conference on Manufacturing Processes, Systems and Operations Management running under the theme “World Class Competitiveness and Sustainability in the Global Market for manufacturing organisations in Africa”.

The conference was in support of the country’s economic blue print, Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation (Zim Asset).

Focus was mainly on how the institutions of higher learning could come in to support the quest for value-addition, beneficiation of local products, and poverty eradication.

Deputy Minister of Industry and Commerce Cde Chiratidzo Iris Mabuwa said it was time the relationship between industry and academia was cemented for the benefit of the country.

“There is a strong interface between institutions of higher learning and the manufacturing sector. The two are expected to make significant contributions to the value addition and beneficiation of the Zim Asset cluster. I am delighted to see researchers and industry people meeting to share knowledge,” said Cde Mabuwa.

“Some developing countries have made great strides in growing and stabilising their economies through strong linkages between academic institutions and industry.”

NUST Pro-Vice Chancellor Professor Samson Sibanda noted than there was an urgent need for academic institutions to come up with innovative research findings that could help drive the economies of the region.

“Together, we have solutions to our economic challenges. We can fully exploit the internal relationships and linkages that exist between researchers, industry and policy makers,” he said.

Experts added that the first step was to close the gap between industry and academic institutions.
For the developed countries, they said, academics drive the economy by offering solutions that can be in the form of new technology and also new business models.

Founder and president of Sojoma Economic Development Institute, an economic intelligence organisation, Dr Khumbulani Mhlophe, said local companies should seek technological solutions from local universities and colleges which have the capacity to improve machinery.

“As a country we need a change of mindset. It is high time industries believe that academics can offer competitive solutions. All these new products that are being produced by companies, are an end product of academic brains,” said Dr Mhlophe.

The conference had many sub-themes under discussion and some of them included Manufacturing and Sustainability, Corporate Governance, Capacity/Capital Utilisation, Value-Addition and Beneficiation, Small to Medium Enterprises in Manufacturing, ICTs in Manufacturing, Environmentally Conscious Manufacturing; Financing Manufacturing and Quality Management.

Chairperson of the Conference Organising Committee Engineer William Goriwondo said interaction between industry and academics provided an opportunity for companies to get new ideas in their areas of business.

He said researchers, through their research findings encouraged the adaptation of latest technology in industry that reduced production costs.

Eng Goriwondo said: “It is from these platforms that industries benefit. They (industries) get to know the best way of doing business and the best machinery to use. Researchers invent new technology after reviewing literature of how the machinery or technology they are studying was made. They make improvements from that and this is where industries benefit.”

As a demonstration of how industry could benefit from research, the Zimbabwe Grain Bag got a boost when one researcher designed an automated bag lining station.

The research showed that Zimbabwe Grain Bag is able to partially meet 30 percent of the monthly fertiliser bag market requirement.

The research was prompted by the fact that the company is able to manufacture 60 000 out of 200 000 bags required monthly by the market. With the machine, production cost will be cut by 87,5 percent.

The other new technology designed was an intergrated jaw and roller crushing machine for gold ore with major emphasis on small-scale gold miners in Zimbabwe that accounts for over 10 percent of total gold output in the country every year.

The machine, if put to use will help miners in their first step (ore comminution) to become self-sustainable in terms of gold processing at their respective mines. As a result, mineral beneficiation and value addition will be supported.

Zimbabwe National Chamber of Commerce second vice-president Mr Davison Norupiri said it was pleasing that universities were complementing Government efforts in helping local companies to be competitive.

“I hope, believe and expect that this conference will indentify and plug the gaps between mere research and the adoption of research output thereof. This should obviously come out as a result of the proposals that will come from this conference,” said Mr Norupiri.