A new paper co-authored by Professor Rob Hope and Professor Katrina Charles together with Quentin Grafton, Daniel Olago, Mashfiqus Salehin, Mohammed Hossain, Rebecca Peters, Ana Gren, Tassew Woldehanna, Muhammad Ibrahim, Emdadul Chowdhury, Mohammad Alam, Kitka Goyol, Rachael McDonnell and Anna Nileshwar has been published in Nature Water. The paper can be accessed here.
Building on the experience working with the REACH Programme, the authors argue that science funding could contribute more towards achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Exploring the concept of science-practitioner partnerships, the paper shows how a patient and outcome-based approach could improve water security for millions of vulnerable people.
The key policy takeaways from the authors are:
- New funding models are required for academics to engage in science-practitioner partnerships
- Funding architecture for international development needs to transition from "science directs" to "science serves", allowing science-practitioner partnerships to adapt to policy priorities in dialogue with context-specific concerns
- Science–practitioner observatories are a key mechanism for all the stakeholders involved to design, execute and evaluate key development challenges
- Science–practitioner partnerships can be strengthened by targeted investments
