Efforts to promote sustainable development must tap into technologies developed locally, driven by community needs and priorities.

SciDev.Net celebrates its tenth anniversary this week — a chance to reflect on a decade of achievement, and the challenges that lie ahead.

Next year's Rio+20 meeting must put science-based innovation at the heart of the development agenda. But the real battle will be political.

Evaluating science in a knowledge economy needs more than just academic criteria.

Technical obstacles to efficient solar energy are shrinking, but economics and politics still challenge its widespread adoption by the poor.

Academics have long argued for developing countries to adopt "systems of innovation". Now it looks like politicians have got the message.

Patents on scientific knowledge may not be as useful — or valuable — as many claim them to be.

The simple communication of key scientific information to the public needs to be improved if sustainable development is to be a realistic goal.

An evaluation of Dutch-funded research programmes in developing countries raises questions about the concept of local "ownership".

China's efforts to build an innovation-based economy require a less hierarchical approach to organising its research system.