The quest to host the Square Kilometer Array – astronomy’s next big thing, to be constructed over 12 years at an estimated cost of $2.2 billion – was an intensive effort. South Africa and Australia were shortlisted as the two finalists thanks largely to geographical happenstance, and each nation sought to improve its standing with the SKA organizing committee through powerpoint presentations highlighting cost projections, ambitious timelines, and supporting infrastructure.
The verdict was to be announced in late May, and the delegations held their breath, hoping they would be selected to host the scientific equivalent of the Olympics. In the end, like an elementary school field day, everyone turned out to be a winner as both nations were incorporated into the project’s final plans.
With South Africa’s integral involvement, the SKA will become one of the very few grand scientific enterprises to be hosted in a developing country. Most high dollar international projects are rooted firmly in the rich world, such as the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland and France or the Human Genome Project in the United States. In contrast, most scientific forays into the developing world are brief, targeted projects – limited in scope, limited in time – that rarely leave lasting legacies.
The effectiveness of international development aid can certainly be debated, but the SKA seems like a particularly promising brand of aid: a long term project of inherent interest to funder nations that engages a wide cross section of the host country across multiple levels of society. Over the coming years, the SKA will demand a vast low-skill labor pool to manufacture the hardware and construct the antennae sites as well as an army of skilled technicians to program and operate the array.
The real hope, however, is that South Africa's highest-profile scientific project will translate into long term domestic interest in science and technology fields while catapulting the country to the upper echelon of places to conduct research. As Bernie Fanaroff, the director of South Africa's bid for the SKA, told SciDev.net, “it will create a significant legacy of skills and be a continuing attraction for young people in Africa to enter careers in science and technology.” It's a bold aim, but one that has never been more realistic for the southern Africa region. (Other African nations - Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia and Zambia - also participated in the South African bid.) After all, many scientists in Europe or the U.S. were initially inspired by large, locally developed projects like particle accelerators or space science experiments, and the SKA is a rare opportunity for South Africa to leverage a high-profile project.
The global prestige associated with the project has also loosened the home government’s purse strings to the tune of a $330 million investment. “If you were to go to government directly and just say that you wanted to increase the budge for science by that type of factor, you would face a struggle,” explains Fanaroff. “However, if you say that this is an iconic project that is going to change the way we see ourselves, and the way that others see us, you are more likely to succeed.” In support of the project, the government has already begun training researchers and created several professorship positions in local universities.
Fanaroff believes the SKA will change the world's perception of Africa more broadly and allow South Africa to improve its standing in the knowledge economy. "At present, people don't see Africa as a place where you do world-class science that produces world-class technology," he says. "They see it as a place where you do research into things such as food security and health. All that is important and has to be done. But you have to go beyond that if you want to play a part in the world economy, where technology and knowledge-based products are going to play a greater and greater role."
For the SKA to reach its full scientific and development potential, however, it must be fully funded and supported by the international consortium tasked with its construction and operation. Unfortunately, there are already worrying signs. U.S.-based astronomers are only tangentially involved, implying that American cash infusions would be limited. Particularly astute tea leaf readers saw evidence of financial strain in the SKA Organization’s decision to place the project in both locations in order to “maximize on investments already made by both Australia and South Africa,” as stated in the official announcement.
The placement of a high-budget, high-profile project like the SKA in the developing world is a rare opportunity for the scientific community to embrace and support southern African involvement. If the world-class science and technology that accompanies the project is folded into a sustainable engine of education and training, some of the SKA's biggest revelations might come not from the far reaches of the universe, but from its own backyard.
