PENANG, 22 September 2014 - According to Programme Officer, Courtney O’Brien, networking, not collaboration, is the way to solve problems and create a positive impact on the community.

Courtney from the Global Knowledge Initiative (GKI) said that GKI, over a period of five years, had managed to reach out to 60 countries, trained 556 people and engaged more that 300 institutions worldwide.

“A university may think that they have something that a community can use but the community may think otherwise,” she said, citing the invention of the Berkeley-Darfur stove in 2005 by scientists from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

She said that it was well researched and designed for use in windy Darfur, Africa, and it has the capability to save up to 75% of firewood as compared to the inhabitants’ three-stone-fire stove.

Firewood savings is important as women had to search for trees in this mostly desolated land, away from the refugee camps that they were staying; there were times when they were attacked, raped or killed.

Despite having such an efficient stove to reduce the risks they had to take while venturing out to look for firewood, the community of Darfur gave the stove a lukewarm reception.

“It was not because of the design that they do so but because of the cost,” she said.

Courtney remarked in her keynote address Harnessing Global Problem Solving Networks in the Collaboration Era at the Asia-Pacific University-Community Engagement Network (APUCEN) 2014 Summit that universities and communities have to explore new areas such as collaborating with the government and the industries that have input or research solutions.

“Hence, there is a need to build a network of multidisciplinary stakeholders from diverse sectors, geographies, ages, languages, ideas and perspectives rather than mere collaboration,” she added.

She outlined the key benefits of networking, stating that it is possible to obtain a clearer understanding of the challenge, a wider view of context for developing the solution, acquire knowledge of what has been tried elsewhere, and breed creativity.

Such networking also enables access to needed resources such as laboratories and technicians besides improving feasibility of a potential solution. - Text: Yong Check Yoon/Photo: Mohd Fairus Md. Isa