Uganda National Academy of Sciences
(UNAS)

Updates: Colloquium on the Ethic of Care and Responsibility in Global Health Partnerships at the UNAIDS headquarters. Geneva, Switzerland, 19 May 2025.

To be the premier national academy of sciences in Africa, facilitating societal transformation.

Our Strategy 2024 – 2029

This strategy builds on past achievements and provides a blueprint for the Academy’s future. It focuses on new and emerging technologies, best scientific practices, innovation, continuous learning, and decolonization of knowledge systems. Its write-up blends traditional and modern approaches to strategy formulation.

The Academy’s aspirations are summarized in its vision statement: “To be the premier national academy of sciences in Africa, facilitating societal transformation,” and its mission statement: “To apply integrated knowledge of the sciences, arts, and humanities to foster systemic shifts in mindsets and practices crucial to our sustained national development.”

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President’s Message on the UNAS Home

Dear UNAS Fellows, Members, Partners, Supporters, and all stakeholders,

What is it about the sciences that inspires us? For me, it has always been about helping my patients. In the early 1990s, when I returned home to Uganda as a young doctor, I recognized that the best way to serve my country and my patients—many of whom were dying unnecessarily to HIV/AIDS—was to use the sciences to make clear their pain and suffering, and also to identify possibilities to alleviate it. This idea of the sciences, as a tool to help illuminate the depths of our problems and reveal the possibilities for a better future, is one that is dear to my heart.

About Us

Created to provide credible, balanced, and evidence-driven advice to the Nation.

The Uganda National Academy of Sciences is an independent, non-profit, nonpolitical, and membership-based service organization. UNAS was created to provide credible, balanced, and evidence-driven advice to the nation on matters of science and development.

UNAS draws its membership from the Fellowship of the Academy who are recognized for their lifetime achievements in the sciences and humanities. Fellows are active contributors to the national and international academic community.

Who We Are

Strategic plan

Our Fellows

These are not only UNAS fellows, but are also individuals who are pioneers or have achieved academic excellence in their specific field of expertise. These fellows have come together under UNAS to guide and give oversight on issues affecting the nation through research, projects, publications, seminars and conferences. See a brief about some of the researchers below.

Prof. Nelson K. Sewankambo

FUNAS, MBCHB, MSC, M.MED, FRCP, LLD (HC),

A Ugandan physician, academician, medical researcher and medical administrator. He is a Fellow of UNAS – FUNAS, and also an external affiliate of Institute of Medicine, USA.

Prof. Mary Jossy N. Okwakol

FUNAS, BSc. , MSc, PHD, MAKERERE UNIVERSITY

The founding Vice Chancellor of Busitema University in Uganda. She holds a B.Sc in Botany/Zoology, M.Sc and PhD in Zoology from Makerere University, with further training at the University of Aberdeen, UK. She is a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society of London.