SEANAC Secretariat visit to Mozambique (Maputo), 4-7th June 2008

Secretariat team
Dr. Harriet Okatch, Dr. Veronica Obuseng, Dr. Simiso Dube, Dr. David Takuwa,
Prof. Mathew Nindi and Prof. Nelson Torto

Objective of the Visit

Familiarization and conducting a needs assessment of analytical chemistry

Places visited

Instrumentation
- Good sharing of facilities between university, industry and public sector
- Some of the work is carried out using classical wet methods
- Fair distribution of old and new instrumentation
- Old instrumentation was mostly non-functional
- New instrumentation not commissioned
- Equipment acquired through donor funding
  - Bought before completion of building
  - Warranty expired before installation
  - Kept under non-ideal conditions
  - Lack of training for users
  - Incomplete deliveries of parts of instruments
  - No regional consultation with similar purpose laboratories
  - No consultation with regional experts before purchasing
Manpower
- Limited number of qualified technicians
- Need to develop analytical academic staff members
- Need to train instrument users
Funding
- Limited funding to purchase, maintain or repair instrumentation
- Limited funding for training
Curriculum
- Engaged in harmonization of curriculum with the region
- Media of communication is Portuguese, thus limiting reference sources
- Inadequate exposure to practical work

SEANAC should increase its efforts to facilitate inventory, access, operation maintenance and repair of analytical instrumentation.
Promote the visibility of SEANAC especially with donor agencies like the African Development Bank and World Bank to make them aware of the role of SEANAC as well as available expertise within Africa
Look into possibilities of scavenging for functional parts of instruments decommissioned from other laboratories to use for repair of instrumentation.
Need to facilitate staff and student exchange
Need to facilitate training of staff