Scientific publishing in West Africa: comparing Benin with Ghana and Senegal

Abstract

We compared scientific indicators related to Benin, Senegal and Ghana. We collected data from Web of Science and used bibliometric indicators like annual production, language and type of publication, citable and cited documents, citations, h-index, field share, specialization index, and international collaboration rate. Results show that Benin performs well regarding the percentage of citable and cited documents, the share of production and the specialization index in the fields of Natural sciences and Agricultural sciences; it occupies the median position with respect to the production and the specialization index in the fields of Engineering and technology on the one hand and Medical and health sciences on the other hand, behind Ghana and ahead Senegal. It lays however behind Ghana and Senegal with respect to the total output, citations per citable or cited documents, h-index, the share of production and specialization index in the fields of Social science and Humanities; it has the highest international collaboration rate. The study revealed that the three countries cooperated less, and only if a third western country intervened. It pointed out the role of Western countries in driving collaboration among developing countries.

Appendices

Appendix 1

See Table 8.

Table 8 More productive countries than Benin in West Africa

Appendix 2

See Table 9.

Table 9 African regions (according to the African Union)

Appendix 3: Characteristics of the intra three countries collaboration

The six papers the three countries shared have 93 co-authors from 17 countries and 29 cities. Cotonou and Dakar represented Benin and Senegal respectively; Ghanaian cities occurred three times, namely Accra, Legon and Tamale. The publication of the 6 papers involved collaboration between 48 institutions; Figure 7 visualized the induced network. It shows two separate components, that is, two groups of institutions that didn’t cooperated in publishing at all. On the one hand, the component on the left counts 30 institutions: some western institutions (University of Arizona - USA, University of Leeds-UK, University of Paris- France, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA, USA), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA, USA), Météo France (France), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD, France), Centre National de Recherche Scientifique (CNRS - France) and on the other hand, mainly national meteorology directorates of West African countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Niger, Ghana, Senegal, etc.). This component is related to 4 of the 6 papers Benin, Ghana and Senegal shared in common. Obviously, their output are related to Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences according to the Web of Science subject areas, and therefore to Earth and related environment sciences according to the OECD FOS. The second component, on the right, groups together 18 institutions among which international organizations or associations with national representations to the West African countries: West Africa Project to Combat AIDS and STI (WAPCAS) in Quebec (Canada) and its national representations in West Africa (Benin, Ghana, Senegal, Mali, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Togo) are the backbone of this component. They are responsible for 2 publications related to Medical and health sciences according to FOS.

Fig. 7

Institutions involved in Benin, Ghana and Senegal’s common papers and their relationships

Over the 48 institutions, 2 are based in each of the three countries, one from each component. The Benin-based are Direction nationale de la météorologie and WAPCAS-Bénin; the Senegal-based are Direction nationale de la météorologie and WAPCAS-Sénégal. Meteorology Service Department and WAPCAS-Ghana represent Ghana. Hence, the three countries based institutions worked together only if a Western or international organisation intervened. Therefore, Western or international organisations or institutions are drivers of collaboration.

The breakdown of the 164 papers resulting from bilateral collaboration with regard to the FOS gives: Natural sciences 16.46 % (27 papers), Engineering and technology 16.46 % (16 papers), Medical and health sciences 60.97 % (100 2 papers), Agricultural Sciences 16.46 % (27 papers), Social sciences 3.05 % (5 papers) and Humanities 0 %. 506 institutions cooperated to achieve these publications and shared up to 13 papers. Figure 8 visualizes the relationships with at least 4 papers. It shows two components: one smaller and one larger. The illustration of the bilateral collaboration is as follows: 1) Benin and Senegal: Université d’Abomey-Calavi shared 13 papers with Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar and 8 papers with the Ecole Inter Etats de Sciences et Médécine Vétérinaires (EISMV, Senegal). IRD Bénin cooperated with the Université Cheikh Antan Diop de Dakar on 5 papers and with IRD-Sénégal on 4 papers. The Centre de Recherche entomologique de Cotonou and IRD Sénégal shared 4 papers. 2) Benin and Ghana: the collaboration involved the Université d’Abomey Calavi and the University of Ghana with 55 papers out of the 60 the two countries shared on the one hand and the Ministries of Health of the two countries (9 papers) on the other hand. This figure doesn’t show any Ghanaian institutions in their relationships with Senegalese. Apart from the main universities from each of the three countries, there is no direct cooperation between research institutions. Universities are the main actors of knowledge sharing within the three countries (Figs. 7, 8).

Fig. 8

Institutions involved in Benin, Ghana and Senegal’s bilateral collaboration and their relationships

Appendix 4

See Table 10.

Table 10 Benin, Ghana and the Précarré africain’s top 10 donors and their contributions (million USD) in 2009–2010