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THE
European Union is strengthening research cooperation
with members of the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (Asean) to address the global food-and-energy
crisis, hitting most of the developing countries in the
region like the Philippines.
EU
director general for research Jose Manuel Silva
Rodriguez is in the country to meet with ministers for
science and technology (S&T) of the Asean members to
establish linkages on science research, particularly on
improving food supply, biomass and alternative-energy
sources.
“We have
to improve research in the area of food supply and
sources of alternative energy,” said Rodriguez in a
press briefing at the EU booth at the World Trade Center
on Monday. “We will have an EU-Asean ministerial
consultation on the possibility of establishing linkages
from basic science to frontier scientific researches.”
Rodriguez is leading a delegation of EU officials for
talks with Asean counterparts in Manila during the 5th
Informal Asean ministerial meeting on Science and
Technology being held from July 6 to 11.
The EU
has allocated a total of €54 billion for cooperation
projects on science and technology with other states
from 2007 to 2013, he said.
The EU
official said he will conduct bilateral meetings with
the S&T ministers from the Philippines, as well as
top-producing Asean members Thailand and Vietnam.
Ambassador Alistair MacDonald, head of the delegation of
the European Commission to the Philippines, said,
meanwhile, that the EU strongly supports
agricultural-research cooperation, particularly the
International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and the
University of the Philippines in Los Baños.
“International cooperation in scientific research is an
essential component of EU-Asean cooperation more
generally, and the EC has for many years been an active
supporter of joint research activities and the exchange
of researchers between Europe and Asia,” said MacDonald
at the press briefing.
He said
the EU has allocated a total of $50 million worth of
research grants for the IRRI since 1976.
Macdonald said the EU will also strengthen assistance to
the Asean Center for Biological Diversity to enable the
agency to conduct more research projects to ensure that
species helpful in food production are preserved. |
