He I Open Science Forum (CILAC 2016) will receive Ministers, Vice-Ministers of Science, Technology and Innovation (CTI) and high national and international authorities on these issues, to participate in five ministerial tables that will be held between September 6 and 9 at the yesevent hall of the Technological Laboratory of Uruguay (see the agenda here).
Improving people's lives, while ensuring environmental sustainability, is one of the challenges faced by the scientific community and decision makers within the framework of the new 2030 Agenda. Scientific knowledge plays a key role in strategic decision making towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The CTI will be besides decisive in understanding the opportunities and barriers that will allow or prevent countries from meeting their commitments, and being able to adjust their public policies as they go.
It is in this context that CILAC is giving the Latin American and Caribbean region an opportunity to reflect as a whole on this essential role of STI. Representatives government from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, Spain, Honduras, El Salvador, Granada, Guyana, Paraguay, Portugal, Dominican Republic, South Africa and Uruguay, have responded to this regional call to exchange experiences and advance common positions.
The participations have been organized into five ministerial tables that will respectively address: STI policies and their instruments; the nexus between education, science and citizenship; cooperation in STI in the Ibero-American space and the instruments of its promotion; STI as key to achieving the SDGs; and the paths to follow in international scientific cooperation for sustainable development.
Among the experiences that will open the exchange, Portugal will present the recent increase in its production and scientific capital and will share the policies and strategies used in this regard. Cuba, for its part, will contribute best practices in matters of promotion of young researchers, among others.
Education is a topic of recurring concern, and the ministerial tables will also deal with it. Among the cases that will be presented is that of Uruguay, which has stood out for its efforts to ensure quality education for all citizens (Sustainable Development Goal 4) and today must respond to new demands for scientific education.
The national presentations will converge towards the importance of strengthening scientific and technological cooperation in the Ibero-American space and the instruments of its promotion. In the scope of the 2030 Agenda, new challenges and new opportunities for scientific collaboration and technology must be designed at both a global and regional level. How to ensure, for example, that the different national STI funding agencies begin to work together in developing a regional and integration vision? Chile will call for reflection on this question. What is Ecuador doing in STI cooperation issues to promote an economy of ideas and innovation? will also trigger joint reflection. Colombia will bring to the table the issue of frontier science, the expensive research infrastructure it requires and therefore the need for close political coordination and necessary regional cooperation.
The results of these days of work will constitute an important contribution to the debates on the development of public science, technology and innovation policies in Latin America and the Caribbean. They will also be fundamental inputs from the region for the next World Science Forum: “Science for Peace”, to be held in Jordan in 2017.
We invite you to participate in press conferences on the progress of these conversations.
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