Ahsan Iqbal stresses R&D institutes to take lessons from contemporary world
Federal Minister and Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Prof Ahsan Iqbal Wednesday emphasised upon the Research and Development (R & D) institutes to take lessons from the contemporary world and accordingly plan their strategies of R&D work to compete with them.
He said this while addressing the inaugural session of a two-day Invention to Innovation Summit-2014.
The federal minister appreciated the efforts of Pakistan Science Foundation (PSF) and other stakeholders for organizing this event and pledged to extend every help for the support of applied aspects of Science & Technology. He emphasised that today was the time of knowledge revolution and the whole scenario of competition is linked with scientific knowledge. He advised universities to go ahead with inter-disciplinary approach where a doctor and engineer could know about each others’ knowledge as they can no longer be successful working in isolation.
PSF Chairman Prof Dr Khalil Ahmed Ibupoto also highlighted the collaborations PSF has made in past through its different programmes bridging gaps between industry and academia. He emphasised that the strong collaboration between Industry and R&D organisations was pre-requisite to pass on the research results to end users. He explained about other initiatives like “Inquiry Based Education” which create originality and individuality in the students, so that their potential could be harnessed by the industry people.
University of the Punjab Vice Chancellor Dr Mujahid Kamran speaking on the occasion emphasised on providing more financial funds and support to education from different organs of the state.
Institute for Research Promotion (IRP) CEO Abid Sherwani introduced about the whole event and provided a brief of the activities jointly taken up by PSF and IRP.
More than 300 technologies engrossed with local R&D were invited to put up to show their ideas through physical prototypes, posters presentations and documentaries etc.
The industries and academia personals also presented their innovative products and research experiences. A total of 60 stalls were in place from 60 public and private sector organizations from across the country.
Ten different workshop sessions of industry and academia experts have been arranged in this summit from different technology sectors like Processing Technologies for Industrial Chemicals, Horticulture Sector, Technology Workshop, Biotechnology, Corporate Session at Networking Dinner, Patenting Intellectual Property Rights, Solar Energy & Renewables, Technologies for Mineral Processing, Accelerating Industry Driven Technologies and the Technologies for Medical Textiles etc. The industrial issues identified during this summit will be taken up jointly by PSF, academia and the industry.
