African institutions are often faced with barriers when it comes to availability and utilization of e-resources from other institutions as well as from the World Wide Web. As a result, most African institutions do not have the vast amount of quality information for research and learning available at hand as compared to their counterparts in developed nations. There has always been the need for aggressive collaborative initiatives that would facilitate interconnection of such institutions locally, regionally and inter-regionally.

National Research and Education Networks have emerged around Africa to represent groups of tertiary institutions. These networks work to bring excellent connectivity between local tertiary and research institutions. The networks formed provide a platform for sharing information, collaborative research, distance learning, and other deliverables.

This paper discusses the status of MAREN, the Malawi Research and Education Network, which has achieved great progress in its pursuit of excellent connectivity for tertiary institutions in Malawi. It focuses on achievements so far and a road map for the future taking into consideration the Aspirations of Africa Universities spelt out in road map, at a Conference on African Research and Education Network Infrastructure held in Tunis in November 2005.

By: Ulemu Nyasulu
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