Why don’t we care about research?

"If we knew what it is we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?" said Albert Einstein. Indeed, research gives us a glimpse of what the future might hold through the study of the information available in the present. Throughout history, countries have developed and advanced through innovation brought forth by research work. Sadly in Bangladesh, the significance of research is yet to be fully realised.

Research is a crucial criterion for determining how well a university is doing, among many others. All top-ranked universities worldwide have a large portion of their fundings allocated for research work. If we look at the top universities on the QS World University Rankings 2022, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the best university in the world, had an expenditure of around USD 762 million. The second top university, Oxford, had a USD 820 million budget as well. If we go further back, we will see a connection between research expenditures and university rankings. While university research funding in wealthy countries should not be compared with that in a country like Bangladesh, there is no ignoring the extent of negligence among the universities in the country, both public and private, in terms of research activities and expenditure.

Compared to the research activities in other countries, Bangladesh is at the bottom of the pond. According to reports from 2006, the number of annual research paper publications in the country was around 400. Although the number has increased since then, it is still not up to the global standard. According to a report by the University Grant Commission (UGC), the total spending for research in 2020 by 38 public universities was Tk 72.91 crore, with Dhaka University at the top, spending Tk 6.61 crore. Even without government funding, private universities came out ahead on research budgets. Brac University spent Tk 55.23 crore on research in the same year, and North South University spent Tk 6.17 crore. Sadly, the average spending on research in all universities in Bangladesh is around one percent of their allocated budget. Chittagong University announced a budget of Tk 360.79 crore for 2021-22 with a 1.52 percent allocation for research. There are hardly any students who consider doing their PhD in Bangladesh.

In the QS World Ranking, there are several criteria to determine the university rankings. One of them is citation per faculty. Citation per faculty is "the total number of citations received by all papers produced by an institution over five years by the number of faculty members at that institution." MIT scored 100 in this category. Comparing our universities with an institution of this magnitude is like comparing apples and oranges. However, compared with the universities in the Indian subcontinent, where the countries are on a similar economic level, Bangladeshi universities still fall short. Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology's (Buet) score of 7.8 in citation per faculty looks pale compared to the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay's (IITB) score of 55.5. Even the National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) in Islamabad, Pakistan has a slightly higher score of 9.1.

Bangladesh is currently a lower-middle-income country, waiting to become a developing country by 2026. However, countries like China and India are spending more and more on research as they are becoming more affluent. Without innovation, a country can never truly develop. As a soon-to-be developing country, are we doing enough for research? Should Bangladeshi universities worry about research? The answer is, yes! Why? Because, there is empirical evidence that research spending is positively correlated with economic development.

Brain drain is a term used to characterise the transfer of talented people from a country to others. This is similar to the "rich getting richer" argument, but from a human resource perspective. Gifted students from Bangladesh seldom consider a university in their own country when pursuing a PhD. Instead, they move abroad, and most of them get accustomed to their life there and stay back, becoming valuable human resources for their host countries. The lack of research activities plays the primary role here as PhD is a research-based degree. If we want to avoid this unfavourable brain drain phenomenon, if we want our talents to contribute to our country's development, we must give them the incentive to do so.

There is hope as well, North South University recently qualified to apply for a Times Higher Education (THE) ranking—the first private university in Bangladesh to do so. There is a high threshold of research output that is needed to be met to be eligible for THE ranking. Things are moving towards a better future; we can only hope that this progress is taking place at all higher educational institutions. Only then can we deliver quality education and an environment for learning.

Quazi Tafsirul Islam is a researcher and management consultant, and a senior lecturer of strategy and human resources at North South University (NSU).   
KASM Iftekharul Haque is a research assistant (RA) at the School of Business and Economics of NSU.