ISLAMABAD:COMSTECH and UNESCO Thursday organized a webinar on ‘Open Science’ with emphasis on strengthening scientific collaborations in the larger benefit of the people.
Prof. Dr. Shahbaz Khan, Director and UNESCO representative to China, Korea, Japan, and Mongolia, Prof. Dr. Zabta Khan Shinwari, Member Pakistan Academy of Sciences, Islamabad, Pakistan, and Prof. Dr. Claudia Bauzer Medeiros, Institute of Computing, University of Campinas, Brazil addressed the webinar by giving one-hour long talk each to more than 250 participants joined online from different OIC states.
Prof. Shahbaz Khan said, if we want to solve global challenges like COVID, then we must share science, its products like vaccines and should be able to make solutions to work together. He said we must nurture cooperation beyond boundaries.
He said that unfortunately, there still exists a scientific and digital divide in the world.
To achieve the sustainable development goals, we need quality science, Prof Shahbaz mentioned and added that open science would create opportunities for increased scientific collaboration, sharing of information and benefits.
Speaking on the occasion, Prof. Shinwari said that as the world was divided into haves and haven’ts and the same is the case with science. He stressed upon doing a lot on the issue of inequality and said that there was need to address the governance and sustainability issues to have open science. He stressed upon the need of a comprehensive policy of inclusiveness, funding, infrastructure and incentives. He said that all scientists are responsible to the society and emphasized that the work of scientists must benefit the society.
Speaking on the occasion, Prof. Claudia said that there was need to do a lot to open science through sharing our data. She said, science is a public good and a basic human right, outputs of publicly financed research are a public good and must be made public as soon as possible, while respecting the principles of scientific ethics, privacy, security and protection of intellectual property. Prof. Claudia said the design, execution and results of a research project should be open under ethical and legal constraints.
In his introductory talk, Coordinator General COMSTECH, Prof. Dr. Iqbal Choudhary said that COMSTECH is striving to gather people from different countries by conducting such webinars to build scientific capacity. He said, we are proud to have a partnership with UNESCO.
Prof. Choudhary said that the cost of publication policy was really an important factor.
He said despite doing good quality science, if you don’t have money you would not be able to publish it, and it is very unfortunate. This publication policy really needs fresh thinking and open science can play an important role, he expressed.