South Africa's mentors

摘要

Nowhere is strong mentoring for young scientists more urgently required than in South Africa. The Centre for Research on Science and Technology at Stellenbosch University has shown that the country's research output declined in nominal terms between 1987 and 2001, and almost halved as a proportion of global scientific output, as measured by the production of articles listed by Thomson Scientific (ISI). South Africa's scientific workforce is ageing, with few young researchers being attracted into the system. In 1990, only 20% of peer-reviewed articles published in South Africa were written by people older than 50, but this figure had risen to 49% by the year 2000.