Kampala — TEACHERS of sciences should be highly motivated so as to promote technological innovations in the country, prominent scientists and researchers advised yesterday.

The scientists, who made their appeal at the National Science Week 2008 conference that opened at Serena Hotel in Kampala, asked the Government to speed up the formulation of the National Policy on Science and Technology.

The policy that has been passed by Cabinet, will propel Uganda into a nation of science, technology and innovation.

"We need to revisit and review the entire education system right from the early stages. We need science that will create innovation and this means we must pay the science teachers very highly," said Prof. Nuhu Hatibu, the Kilimo Trust Chief Executive officer.

He said the Government should facilitate the construction of laboratories in all schools. "The Government should create a pool of best science and mathematics teachers who can be used to train students. We need to convert science into technology and technology into investment," he said.

Kyambogo University deputy vice-chancellor, Prof. Opuda Asibo, said, "What we have today are just copycats. People who are supposed to be studying are not studying. It is the few in urban centres who are learning yet the brains are left in the rural areas."

He said Uganda could only come out of this trap if it overhauled the entire education process. "Three-quarters of the scientists here today were from rural areas nor urban. Brains are in rural areas not in Kampala and that is where the Government should concentrate," Asibo said.

He urged the Government to provide scholarships for science students in all universities in order to promote science.

Prof. Dr. Florence Muranga, the director of the Presidential Initiative on Banana Industrial Development, said Uganda needed to follow the path that Asia took. "We should be discussing how the Asia tigers made it. We need to change from theory to action," she said.