By Fredrick Obura
At 34, years old Nina Dudnik is still touched by witnessing the development of the ‘miracle rice’, a drought resistant variety hailed as one of the answers to food insecurity in Africa.
A firm believer in ‘science for social change’, Nina was thrilled with the opportunity to work for a short time with the team developing the New Rice For Africa.
Nina says she is a believer in science for social change. |
The ‘wonder rice’ –– originally developed by scientists of the West Africa Rice Development Association (WARDA), an intergovernmental rice research centre — is a cross between an ancient, hardy African rice variety and a high-yielding Asian variety.
It combines features of resistance to drought and pests, higher yields even with little irrigation or fertiliser, and more protein content than other types of rice.
"Science has many possibilities. It can solve most of the problems developing countries face," she says the American.
This belief and the fact that Africa has many great minds pushed Nina’s next project in Kenya and other developing countries.
She went on a mission to reclaim surplus lab equipment to enable scientists in Kenya and other developing countries ‘work at their optimum’.
Project’s vision
Few people understood Nina’s ‘obsession’ with collecting the unused lab equipment.
She says her stint at a rice research institute stirred her dream to collect scientific equipment that her colleagues in the US thought were ‘behind the technology curve’.
Over two weeks ago, her organisation Seeding Labs donated equipment worth Sh63 million to Kenyatta University for research.
The 27 faculty members in the Kenyatta’s Chemistry department are currently training about 4,000 students --–3,500 undergraduate students, 35 Master’s students, and two PhD students.
In addition to the teaching, the faculty is pursuing research in natural products, analytical chemistry, organic chemistry, environmental chemistry, and other interdisciplinary projects.
"By reducing the cost of obtaining equipment, we give institutions like Kenyatta the opportunity to use their limited budgets to cover other research costs including chemicals and trainee support," says Nina.
A firm believer in science for social change, she hopes the equipment will help students and lecturers to increase research output that can help Kenya move forward.
She says, this in turn feeds back into the ability to obtain more grants based on new research findings, which can cover the costs of future equipment needs and training of even more students.
"We know that the changes we hope to see in the work of our colleagues overseas will take place slowly over years, in our most recent survey, our scientists reported that they are now training students, post-doctors and research assistants," she says.
Future scientists
Since 2002, Seeding Labs has grown from donating small equipment like pipettes to bigger machines to ‘unlock the scientific creativity in developing countries.
Seeding Labs is a non profit organisation that reclaims and refurbishes laboratory equipment from universities, hospitals and biotechnology companies in order to equip talented scientists and clinicians living and working in the developing world
"I realised how casually we accept as fact the idea that our material resources are disposable. In the US, not only are we throwing away a staggering quantity of those tubes and pipette tips, we are letting larger machinery, equipment that’s in perfect working condition, just a little bit behind the technology curve, gather dust in a storeroom or take up space in a landfill. What we have in abundance, the rest of the world desperately needs. I have seen first-hand the difference a simple opportunity can make. Once I realised these things, everything else just seemed inevitable," she says.
The researcher says her mission is to encourage scientific research in countries like Kenya because it could provide an answer to many of the country’s headaches — including food insecurity.
"The students in Nairobi will be the next generation of Kenya’s scientists and leaders. The training they receive in the labs we equip will prepare them to tackle the issues facing their communities and change lives in their country," she says.
"I am inspired by discoveries like that of the Nerica rices, varieties that have improved lives of individuals leaving on less than a dollar a day" she says.
The novel variety has earned accolades, including a Time magazine mention of some of the researchers who came up with the variety.
She observed the development of these varieties while working at the West Africa Rice Development Association (WARDI) in Ivory Coast from 2000-2001.
Birth of a dream
After returning to the US from the Ivory Coast, she felt eager to help more scientists like the ones she had worked with there..
She formed Seeding Labs eight years ago, jointly with other colleagues at Harvard University.
"While at the university, I mingled with students from all over the world; we shared experience on the opportunities and challenges faced by researchers in the developing nations.
"Africa like Asia and Latin America has knowledgeable people, and abundant resources. It seemed to me that a lack of the proper tools to link up the two is one of the key obstacles," she says.
The organisation targets public universities in the underdeveloped countries. Since its inception it has disbursed laboratory equipments worth over Sh30 billion to 14 countries spread across the world
Future beneficiaries will include University of Nairobi, Egerton and Moi universities.
The equipments including will support research and help in improving on the quality of education in the Institution.
"We are beginning longer term projects in Africa and specifically Kenya where science, technology and innovation are designated as one of the six fundamental pillars of economic advancement," she says.
| Nina, Kenya’s ambassador to the US, Peter Ogego, (right) and others during a ceremony in New York, last year |
Her motto
In an interview with the Sunday Magazine, she said scientists with abundant resources have a responsibility to share these important tools with their colleagues in the developing world. This is because great tools helps a lot in promoting innovation.
"At institutions in the US, the laboratory hallways are full of old but usable scientific equipment that had been placed there when researchers upgraded to new models or simply cleaned house." she says.
She adds: "I knew that these tools and supplies could be a vital life-line for scientists n the developing nations who had in many cases gotten educations at top universities in America, Europe or Japan, and who had returned to their homelands to do work on research vital to themselves and their communities."
Asked what advice or quote do she keeps close to heart as a social change leader she said: "About three years ago, someone gave me a business card on which was printed: ‘Do one thing every day that scares you.’ I have kept it in my wallet ever since, and those words have often been the final thing that propelled me over my hesitations."
She graduated with a biochemistry degree from Brown University (America) in 1998. In 2008, Nina won a two-year fellowship from Echoing Green to become the first full-time Executive Director of Seeding Labs.
