The note looks at the results of a Bankmission for the development of indigenous knowledge (IK) inFrancophone Africa, namely in Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso,and Cameroon, which was based on consultations withprivate-public counterparts involved in promoting itsdevelopment. Although there is an abundance of initiatives,and activities occurring to develop IK - in health,agriculture, education, natural resource management, andcultural affairs - it is nonetheless, unevenly distributedthroughout the four countries: seldom is IK promotion, partof public policy; there is a marked divergence among sectorsof development; most IK initiatives have been undertaken insocial sectors, much fewer in agriculture, and far lesserinitiatives in technology, finance, and engineering; and,practices in the use of African languages are mostlyconditioned by a host of other policy concerns. Onrecognizing the value of IK, suggestions indicate variants,such as taking IK as a heritage of accumulated wisdom, as anembodiment of specific African modes of thought, and, as ameans of articulating local know-how. On building thechallenge for increased IK, the note recommends theinclusion of IK in development projects, by explicitlyinvolving local actors in the design of interventionmethods; by disseminating the methodology for aparticipatory local development; by identifying centers tobecome the collective focus of IK; and, by designing pre-and in-service methods for professional training of development.
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