Africa Produces Just 2.2% of Global Scientific Publications, Says US-based Scholar

A US-based Nigerian academic, Dr. Cyril Obi, has urged African policymakers and scholars to rethink the continent’s approach to knowledge production, warning that Africa remains largely invisible in global research output.

Speaking at the UN-OSSA 2025 Academic Conference on Africa, Obi cited UNESCO figures showing the continent contributes only 2.2 per cent of global scientific publications despite growing university enrolment.

He said Africa cannot drive meaningful development without reclaiming the power to define its own epistemology.

“Freedom and liberation have to do with the power to define what principles will undergird knowledge production,” he noted.

Describing this as “epistemic sovereignty”, Obi questioned why African knowledge systems remain subordinate to foreign frameworks.

He argued that intellectual justice is won through struggles within academic spaces, not through legal processes.

Obi lamented that African scholarship remains largely “invisible”, adding: “It’s either African scholars sitting under a tree staying away from the hot sun, or what they are producing is not counted.”

He called for deliberate decolonisation of universities and curricula to reflect local realities and indigenous knowledge.

The former Senior Research Fellow at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, Lagos, further urged African scholars to adopt selective engagement with external models.

“Africa’s transformation will only come from within — in the way we think, who we imitate, and what we want to accomplish,” he said.