Supporting Innovation in Central America and the Caribbean

Central American University was one of the region’s top private universities and a premier biotechnology institute. That is, until 2023, when the Nicaraguan government seized the school’s assets and fired its leaders. The university takeover was the culmination of years of increasing restrictions on academic activities that had?led many of the nation’s researchers to emigrate.

“Other Latin American and Caribbean countries are also struggling to maintain scientific research capacity in the face of dysfunctional governance structures that have immiserated their citizens,” note Jorge Huete-Pérez ,? Douglas Massey , and?Anthony Clayton. This situation, they argue, will hinder socioeconomic development.

One way to reverse this trend is for the international scientific community to support universities and research centers in Latin American and Caribbean countries to leverage the region’s rich natural, cultural, and intellectual resources. Huete-Perez and his coauthors suggest aligning research investments with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals, which “can improve people’s lives and contribute to the stability of the region.”

Read more about how scientific institutions inside and outside Latin America and the Caribbean can link science and technology with development in the region.