Fostering Egalitarianism Through Globalisation of Africa’s Indigenous Knowledge and Technology (IK&T) for Enhanced Industrial Development and Global Competitiveness

Globalisation is defined as the process of strengthening economic, political, social and cultural relations across the globe aimed at inspiring homogenisation of political and socio-economic principle worldwide. The belief is that it impacts significantly on Africa through methodical rearrangement of collaboration among its nations, by removing, among several others, cultural, commercial and communication barriers. The problem that arises is the assumption that these African states are equal in status, strength and resources even with industrialised countries in Asia, Europe and America. The answer is affirmatively ‘no’. How then do we make the unequal states of Africa equal in the arrangement, in order to benefit from globalisation and ensure stimulation of Africa’s industrial development for global competitiveness? This is the focus of this chapter. Relying on secondary and historical data, the chapter employs human factor (HF) theory and posits that capacity and capability building in indigenous technology development is a facilitator for nationwide advancement, in the midst of other factors, its propensity to provide the required backing for growth in the key areas of the economy, mainly in farming and manufacturing. The main argument thus is that development of Africa’s indigenous technology, an important and neglected African resource, its innovations and adaptation are unequivocally mandatory for refining production techniques required to drive progress, African empowerment and global competitiveness. This is so in that technology invented based on people’s culture, tradition and needs and which is adopted for use in their environment can be easily understood, adopted and adapted for increased productivity and industrial development. This will bring the countries in the continent to be equal participants/partners and beneficiary in the globalisation process.