Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa unveils second MeerKAT antenna
DAVID MANDAHA DEPUTY President Cyril Ramaphosa and the Minister of Science and Technology unveiled the second of the 64 MeerKAT antennae on Saturday, February 28.
The South African MeerKAT radio telescope, currently being built outside Carnarvon in the Northern Cape, is a precursor to the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) telescope, and will be integrated into the SKA during the first phase of construction. The SKA is being built in Africa and in Australia.
Africa established a shub for expanding scientific enquiry
“It is particularly significant that eight other African countries will be involved in hosting the second phase of the project. This promises to establish Africa as a hub for expanding scientific inquiry,” said the deputy president.
The event was attended by ministers from the Presidential Infrastructure Coordinating Committee, Northern Cape Premier Sylvia Lucas, local mayors, community members, and ambassadors and high commissioners from France, Germany, Portugal, China, Zambia and Mozambique.
Appreciating the broader benefits of this project to South Africa, government has identified the SKA as a strategic infrastructure project, overseen by the Presidential Infrastructure Coordinating Committee.
During the visit, Deputy President Ramaphosa welcomed the huge benefit brought to Africa by the hosting of the SKA and urged that full advantage of this substantial project be taken.
Transforming the economy through human capital development
“The 699 students and postdoctoral fellows who have been supported through the SKA South Africa bursary and fellowship programme are at the forefront of this effort. The project is developing technical and artisanal skills while producing a new cohort of young scientists,” he said.
The deputy president described the project as a significant part of interventions to improve the lives of people. “The SKA forms part of efforts to transform South Africa’s economy through human capital development, innovation, value addition, industrialisation and entrepreneurship. It will create jobs, not only during the next decade or so of construction, but also for the next 50 years of operation and maintenance. Science and technology can do much in the fight against poverty, unemployment and inequality.”
Ramaphosa said the project was developing skills needed by South Africa. “Scientists are not born. They are made. They are the products of a society that values knowledge, promotes learning, and rewards innovation. They are products of a society that reads, of schools that work, and parents that are engaged in the intellectual development of their children.”
The deputy president commended Dr Bennie Fanaroff, director of SKA South Africa, for his sterling work in the SKA project, and unveiled a plaque naming the second dish in his honour. The minister of science and technology and her predecessors were also praised for their contribution.
Minister Pandor vowed that the SKA project would meet its deadlines. “By the end of 2016 we will have the 64 MeerKAT dishes ready for commissioning, and by 2017 the telescope will be ready to do science.
“We are proud that, even before the MeerKAT has been completed, five years of observing time on it have already been allocated to more than 500 radio astronomers, 85 of them from Africa.
“This demonstrates massive confidence in South Africa's scientific infrastructure, in which the Department of Science and Technology continues to invest.”
The SKA will help to answer fundamental questions about the universe, including how the first stars and galaxies were formed after the Big Bang, how galaxies have evolved since then, the role of magnetism in the cosmos, the nature of gravity and the possibility of life beyond Earth.