CASE STUDIES FROM AFRICA

6. HIGHER EDUCATION SERVICES: A CASE STUDY OF
UGANDA
Authors: Sherry Stephenson and George F. Walusimbi-Mpanga
Executive Summary
The African Union Commission (AUC) has earmarked the enhancement of trade in services as
an important emerging new opportunity and has adopted the Action Plan for Boosting Intra-
African Trade as a first step towards a Continental Free Trade Agreement (CFTA) which,
amongst others, is anchored in trade in services.
This case study on Uganda’s higher education, one of five commissioned by the AUC, was
conducted with assistance from the United States Agency for International Development
(USAID) to promote knowledge and understanding of higher education as a basis for sector
development and enhanced regional integration; provide information on the export of higher
education by selected universities and institutions of higher learning to help support the
establishment of an African Trade Observatory; evaluate the effectiveness of the Government of
Uganda’s policy in fostering the export of higher education; review the regulatory and
institutional context for the export of higher education by focusing on the role of the National
Council for Higher Education (NCHE) and the Inter-University Council for East Africa
(IUCEA).
The study was compiled using a combination of approaches. Primary data was collected
through face-to-face interviews with 20 key-informant respondents drawn from 13 institutions,
namely a public university, its semi-autonomous business school, 7 private universities, 2
government institutions, and a regional organization. The case study lays special emphasis on
distance education; therefore all of Uganda’s virtual universities have been covered to
understand their challenges in delivering study programs to students in other countries using
online distance media. A total of 18 meetings were held to collect field data. Literature reviews
of previous studies, reports, policy documents, and other secondary data helped in reviewing
Uganda’s export performance in the higher education sector.
The study noted that globally, education is the second largest sector after healthcare, with total
global expenditure on education estimated at US$ 4.5 trillion in 2012. The global education
market is reported to be growing at an annual compound rate of 7% over the period 2012–2017
and is projected to peak at US$ 6.3 trillion by 2017.
Whereas the export of education has traditionally relied on the mobility of natural persons
(students and teachers), emerging global trends increasingly point to a paradigm shift towards
the mobility of providers in different countries as well as through distance learning programs.
This shift had created new possibilities, namely joint degrees between universities, dual degree
programs, universities setting up branch campuses abroad, colleges offering local and foreign
qualifications, distance and e-learning programs, and franchising courses to universities abroad.
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