About Us

Our Mission

Our mission is to be a trusted partner to ensure research and innovation thrives and supports sustainable living in St Helena, enriching people’s lives, protecting our culture, heritage and natural environment. We seek to inspire and encourage scientific enquiry and life-long learning on St Helena to acquire new knowledge to solve problems that enrich people’s lives, protect our culture, heritage and natural environment.

The St Helena Research Institute is part of a growing network of Research Institutes across the South Atlantic and UK Overseas Territories, generating and sharing knowledge for the benefit of the Overseas Territories. The St Helena Research Institute has been established as a ‘Sister’ Institute to the South Atlantic Environmental Research Institute (SAERI).

Our Goals

To promote and expand reputable research on St Helena, that contributes to sustainable development

To protect St Helena’s people, heritage and environment

To ensure equitable benefit sharing, maximising benefits to St Helena and the researcher

To promote ethical and responsible high quality research that respects, protects and benefits St Helena’s society, culture, heritage and environment

Our Operating Environment

St Helena is a UK Overseas Territory in the South Atlantic Ocean. The Island is self-governing, has a stable political environment and elections for local councillors are held every four years.

In October 2017, scheduled air services to the Island commenced replacing the previous means of access, the RMS St Helena, which completed her last voyage to the Island in February 2018. Significantly reducing the time it takes to get on and off the island has created an enabling environment for the expansion and development of research and academia.

Policy making on St Helena is currently guided by a 10 Year Plan 2017-2027. Under seven main headings and National Goals, the Island is working towards an Island that is Altogether: Safer, Healthier, Better for Children and Young People, Greener and Wealthier with Effective Infrastructure and an Effective, Efficient and Accountable Public Sector with the objective to continue to make St Helena a wonderful place to live, work, raise children, visit and to do business. Robust evidence is key to making the best decisions for the Island, both now and in the future. SHRI aims to become a key player in developing the evidence base to support the development of Government policy in St Helena. This will require that the Institute works across a range of fields in order to provide a sufficiently broad evidence base.

The Island’s Sustainable Economic Development Plan, SEDP (2018-2028) supports the delivery of the 10 Year Plan and focuses on raising the standard of living and improving quality of life. The SEDP identifies Improving links with academic institutions, and increasing the level of research carried out on-Island as a key activity moving forward. It also seeks to open up St Helena to new economic markets and opportunities by working towards the delivery of a fibre optic cable for the Island. St Helena aims to install of a transatlantic submarine fibre optic cable (Google’s Equiano cable) by 2021 and is seeking to attract commercial interest in establishing satellite earth stations on St Helena.

St Helena also seeks to produce all electricity by renewable means by 2022 (Energy Strategy (2016) and establish the island as a leader in this field.

Visit Us

Canarvon Court,
Education Learning Centre, Jamestown, St Helena, STHL 1ZZ

T: +(290) 22607 Ext No: 221
E: rebecca.cairns-wicks@sainthelena.gov.sh

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