African countries urged to turn brain drain into brain circulation

African countries have been urged to harness the expertise of their citizens in the diaspora to strengthen higher education, research and innovation on the continent. The Technical Advisor to Ghana’s Minister of Education, George K.T. Oduro, who made the call at the opening ceremony of the 2026 Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Programme (CADFP) Convocation, said African-born academics working abroad could play a significant role in developing universities on the continent if opportunities were created for them to share their knowledge and expertise with local institutions.

He added that the continent had for years grappled with brain drain, resulting in the loss of some of its finest academic talents to institutions in the Global North. The three-day convocation, which opened on Tuesday in Accra is being organised by the Institute of International Education and the Association of African Universities. It brought together fellowship alumni, university leaders, academics and programme stakeholders to celebrate the achievements of the initiative and discuss ways of sustaining academic partnerships between Africa and its diaspora.

Research priorities Prof. Oduro further called for future fellowship engagements to be aligned with Africa’s development priorities, including climate adaptation, renewable energy, public health, biomedical innovation, artificial intelligence, agriculture and food security. He cautioned that the pursuit of global citizenship through higher education should not come at the expense of African identity and cultural values.

“True global citizens are not rootless wanderers; they are deeply rooted in their heritage, contributing to the world from a place of cultural confidence and identity,” he said. He further called on African governments and private sector organisations to increase domestic investment in higher education research to complement philanthropic funding and ensure local ownership of academic partnerships.

Prof. Oduro also proposed three priority actions to institutionalise the collaborations, including embedding joint programmes into university curricula, increasing government and private sector support for research, and establishing durable academic networks linking African universities, research councils and diaspora academic associations. Sustaining partnerships The Head of Information Technology of the Association of African Universities (AAU), Dr Thomas Songu, said African universities needed to move beyond individual academic connections to build structured and sustainable institutional partnerships.

He said the value of the fellowship programme should not be measured only by the number of awards made or academic visits undertaken, but by the lasting institutional benefits arising from the engagements. “The real value lies in the institutional capacity and strength of research collaboration to sustain academic programmes, improve innovations and develop future generations of scholars,” he said.

New initiative, Achievements The Executive Vice-President of the Institute of International Education (IIE), Jonah Kokodyniak, said a new initiative, the African Diaspora Fellowship Initiatives (ADFI), was being launched to sustain and expand the achievements of the CADFP. He said the independent not-for-profit organisation would build on the fellowship programme’s achievements and provide opportunities for continued academic collaboration between African institutions, diaspora scholars and skilled professionals.

Mr Kokodyniak said the CADFP, established in 2013, had provided more than 750 fellowships and engaged more than 250 universities across the African continent. He said Ghana had been one of the programme’s major host countries, alongside Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa.