LINK Centre (Learning Information Networking Knowledge Centre)

Permanent URI for this communityhttps://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/handle/10539/19250

The Wits LINK Centre is a leading African academic research and training body focused on ICT ecosystem policy and practice. Based at the Wits Tshimologong Digital Innovation Precinct in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, LINK engages in knowledge production and capacity-building for the broad communications and information and communications technology (ICT) sector in Africa. Its focus spans across policy, regulation, management and practice in telecommunications, Internet, broadcasting, digital media, e-government, e-transformation and e-development, all with an emphasis on economic and social implications in African and other developing-world contexts. LINK publishesThe African Journal of Information and Communication (AJIC), which is accredited by the South African Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET). Director: Dr. Lucienne Abrahams: luciennesa@gmail.com

For technical questions regarding this collection, contact Nina Lewin, nina.lewin@wits.ac.za, who is the responsible librarian.

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    Indigenous Knowledge and Vocational Education: Marginalisation of Traditional Medicinal Treatments in Rwandan TVET Animal Health Courses
    (LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2021-05-31) Ezeanya-Esiobu, Chika; Oguamanam, Chidi; Ndungutse, Vedaste
    This study explores Rwandan ethno-veterinary knowledge and the degree to which this knowledge is reflected in the country’s technical and vocational education and training (TVET) instruction. The knowledge considered is the Indigenous medicinal knowledge used by rural Rwandan livestock farmers to treat their cattle. Through interviews with farmers, TVET graduates and TVET teachers, and an examination of the current TVET Animal Health curriculum, the research identifies a neglect of Indigenous knowledge in the curriculum, despite the fact that local farmers use numerous Indigenous medicinal innovations to treat their animals. The focus of the Rwanda’s TVET Animal Health curriculum is on Western-origin modern veterinary practices. The authors argue that this leaves Rwandan TVET Animal Health graduates unprepared for optimal engagement with rural farmers and with the full range of potential treatments.
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    Indigenous Peoples, Data Sovereignty and Self-Determination: Current Realities and Imperatives
    (2020-12-15) Oguamanam, Chidi
    This study explores the current state and dynamics of the global Indigenous data sovereignty movement—the movement pressing for Indigenous peoples to have full control over the collection and governance of data relating to their lived realities. The article outlines the movement’s place within the broader push for Indigenous self-determination; examines its links to big data, open data, intellectual property rights, and access and benefit-sharing; details a pioneering assertion of data sovereignty by Canada’s First Nations; outlines relevant UN and international civil society processes; and examines the nascent movement in Africa. The study identifies a fundamental tension between the objectives of Indigenous data sovereignty and those of the open data movement, which does not directly cater for Indigenous peoples’ full control over their data. The study also identifies the need for African Indigenous peoples to become more fully integrated into the global Indigenous data sovereignty movement.
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    Towards a Tiered or Differentiated Approach to Protection of Traditional Knowledge (TK) and Traditional Cultural Expressions (TCEs) in Relation to the Intellectual Property System
    (LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2019-06-28) Oguamanam, Chidi
    The World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) has, for nearly two decades, engaged in formulating the nature and content of a text-based legal instrument or instruments for the effective protection of genetic resources (GRs), traditional knowledge (TK), and traditional cultural expressions (TCEs, also known as folklore) within or relating to the international intellectual property (IP) system. This task has been the job of WIPO’s Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore (IGC), established in 2000. In this article, I explore the context and rationales for, and evolution of, one of the IGC’s evolving contributions: development of a tiered or differentiated approach to the protection of TK and TCEs. The article discusses and analyses the empirical ramifications and challenges of the tiered approach—alternatively referred to as differentiated approach—with reference to examples of forms of TK and TCE in Africa, North America and Australia. I conclude that the approach is a work in progress, still evolving, which provides a useful broad policy framework at the international level while, at the same time, its details are contingent on many considerations better addressed at national and local levels.