مجلس التعليم » السيد شهاب: الاستراتيجية الوطنية للبحث العلمي وظفت للرقي بالإنسان

12-07-2018

Times of Oman

Muscat: His Highness Sayyid Shihab bin Tariq Al Said, Adviser to His Majesty the Sultan, Chairman of the Research Council affirmed that the Council is keen to develop a national strategy that outlines the path of scientific research and development in the Sultanate in connection with the track of comprehensive development plans being executed by the Government in a bid to develop the Omani citizen.

The mission formulated for the scientific research represented in establishing an innovative system fulfilling the local requirements and global trends, enhancing social harmony and driving towards innovation and scientific excellence. The main themes of the strategy represented in building and possessing a broad research capacity, achieving research excellence in selected fields of national importance, establishing stimulating milieu for scientific research, knowledge transfer and acquiring value from scientific research.

In a speech to the new issue of Shurufat Al Majlis magazine, Sayyid Shihab said that the national strategy for scientific research includes three stages of implementation namely the empowerment phase through removing obstacles where the Council sought to establish a system of programmes to support researchers while providing financial support for conducting research, providing research equipment, laboratories.

The second phase is the harmonisation phase between building research capacity and research potentials with requirements development in the Sultanate. A number of strategic programmes were launched with the aim of providing scientific solutions for prioritised national issues, such as road accidents, Red Palm Weevil (RPW), renewable energy and the social observatory among others. The third phase is building the future as this phase focused on setting up research excellence centres to narrow the gap between research conducted by research and academic institutions and requirements of the private sector in a bid to find scientific solutions for the challenges facing the sector.

Sayyid Shihab pointed out that research capacity in most developing countries was limited in human or equipment aspects, so it was necessary to focus on national priorities related to research and innovation, as well as focusing on all matters that provide the Sultanate competitive advantages compared to other countries, such enhanced oil recovery (EOR) as it is considered a national priority for the Sultanate.

He also added that the Council, in conjunction with various government and private agencies and the civil community sought to development the national innovation strategy. Reasons of success of some countries were analysed to benefit from outcomes of research and innovation in supporting socioeconomic activities. The strategy was prepared to be a platform for activating ties among all industrial, academic and research institutions, as well as civil community organisations that seek to benefit from science and knowledge to support socioeconomic development.

The strategy aims to make the Sultanate among the leading countries in the innovation field (within best 20 countries in 2040).

Sayyid Shihab bin Tariq Al Said, Adviser to His Majesty the Sultan, Chairman of the Scientific Research said that the Council and Petroleum Development Oman (PDO), in cooperation with the Ministry of Oil and Gas launched the platform (IGAD); an electronic platform to activate cooperation between the industrial sector and the academic and research sector in the Sultanate in the field of energy, under the umbrella of Institute of Integrated Advanced Technologies.

The electronic platform allows the industrial sector to present the industrial challenges faced by researchers in universities and colleges and review such challenges electronically, as well as proposing solutions that will lead to guiding research in universities to applied research closely related to industry, in addition to developing cooperation among these institutions to allow financial support to academic and local research institutions.

Sayyid Shihab affirmed that the platform will seek encouraging activities of scientific research and innovation in the energy field through organising workshops, conferences and training for building national capacities. It also aims to encourage industrial establishments to invest in country value (ICV) to support research and innovations related to the energy field.