Ambitious plan for homegrown PhD programmes
A total of 5,000 PhDs by the end of 2025. This is what Ethiopia’s Ministry of Science and Higher Education aims for, according to a five-year project that has recently been unveiled.
This initiative, identified as the Homegrown Collaborative PhD Programmes (HCPP), is partly a reaction to the government’s discontent with the limited expansion of PhD programmes and a response to an emerging need for high-level skills driven by the demands of the country’s new economic policy.
PhD training in Ethiopia has shown a significant improvement over the past decade. From a low of 31 doctoral students in 2006-07, the national annual intake reached more than 5,000 candidates in 2020. In addition to local programmes, scholarships and paid programmes abroad continue to produce additional PhD graduates.