Depletion of natural resources is a national issue, as well as a local one in Mozambique, where numerous communities depend for their survival, on the judicious exploitation of their physical environment. It is particularly felt along the country's extensive coastline, where harvesting sea...

The note looks at the results of a Bank mission for the development of indigenous knowledge (IK) in Francophone Africa, namely in Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Cameroon, which was based on consultations with private-public counterparts involved in promoting its development. Although there is...

Indigenous healing has shown itself to be an effective treatment for the trauma suffered by children in war-torn countries of Africa. Recent experience in Mozambique demonstrates that other dimensions of local culture may be just as important in socially "grounding" a generation of young people...

The note explores the dimensions of the initiative to abandon the practice of female genital cutting (FGC), which begun in Senegal, and spread nationwide, and to several other African countries. This initiative took part in a non-formal education program, sponsored by a Senegal-based...

Indigenous knowledge in Africa, and the world over, is expressed in language, and usually in an "indigenous" language - in short, the mother tongue of inhabitants of the locality, or a lingua franca in regular usage by them. Are these languages simply a neutral medium? Are they just instrumental...

Though the development, articulation, and systematization of indigenous knowledge in Africa are most often seen as issues of culture and local epistemology, they have at the same time critical power dimensions. The relation between local knowledge bases - and practitioners - on the one hand and...

Based on research from an evaluation of functional adult literacy during the late 70s, focused on peanut-growing in the western region of Mali, results demonstrated that while literacy programs only attained its full quantitative objectives in just a few localities, the vast majority of...

One of the down-sides of worldwide agricultural development, has been the replacement of native plant species by marketable crops, accompanied by a reduction in the diversity of the seed stock. This accounts for the disappearance of plants with potential medicinal uses, particularly in high...

Indigenous knowledge in West African schools, has yet to gain its stand in the official education sector in order to certify knowledge, and train the next generation, a sector seemingly unlikely to embrace local knowledge, or regard indigenous science as a legitimate source of inspiration....

The note identifies the essential ingredients - employment, meaning, and self-direction - through examples that represent efforts to fill the void in apprenticeship of adult roles, for impoverished young people thrown out of a traditional framework, and into the vortex of African cities. And...