In March 2010, the Higher Commission for Scientific Research (HCSR) started the implementation of activities within its project for “Setting the national policy for science, technology, and innovation in Syria”. Since its beginning, AFEI General Secretary has been involved in this project as one of the representatives of business sector.
Activities started with distributing a questionnaire to various institutions concerned with setting and implementing the national policy for science, technology and innovation with the objective to assess the development sectors according to specific criteria (economic, scientific, social, and strategic significance) and the impact of research topics on each sector in order to define priority topics for research and development. Then, on2/3/2010, a workshop was organized with participation of a large number of researchers and business sector representatives where priorities of scientific research were discussed. Based on the results of the questionnaire, the priority sectors were defined (energy, agriculture, industry, water, health, communication, and capacity building); HCSR board of directors then added the “environment” to priority sectors.
Sectoral committees were established with a resolution of the prime minister and assigned the task of analyzing the status-quo of each sector, examining the future trends in it, and offering proposals for developing the sector through scientific research and technological development in harmony with priorities adopted for the sector and the 11th Five Year Plan. AFEI General Secretary participated in meetings and activities of the “Industry sector committee” as a representative of the business sector, and contributed with a paper on the AFEI vision for science, technology, and innovation policy in the engineering sector. The committee presented its proposal which was discussed in a workshop on 23/12/2010 with participation of the AFEI General Secretary and consultant from AFEI Damascus Office.
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