PUTRAJAYA, 30 July 2012 – H.E. Dr. Kim Doh-Yeon, Chairman of Korea’s National Science and Technology Commission (NSTC) expressed his country’s keen interest to collaborate with Malaysia in R&D especially in the area of green technology. Dr. Kim said this during an hour-long discussion with YB. Datuk Haji Fadilah Haji Yusof, Deputy Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Malaysia in Putrajaya this morning. He led an eight-member delegation from NSTC, Korea Institute of S&T Evaluation and Planning and the Korean Embassy.

NSTC was launched on 28th March 2011, as an agency with a mission to set S&T policy priorities and conduct inter-ministerial coordination of R&D programs and S&T policies in ROK. It was formed to improve the efficiency of R&D activities and S&T policy programmes primarily caused by the redundancy and duplication among R&D projects. According to Dr. Kim, for the year 2012, the NSTC received a budget of US$15 billion for R&D.

Dr. Kim Doh-Yeon stressed that R&D cooperation with Malaysia is part of his country’s bigger plan to expand its R&D network in Asia. The NSTC Chairman iterated that Korea is focusing on green growth for the year 2012 and would like to collaborate with MOSTI and its agencies in pursuing R&D in green technology.

In response, YB. Datuk Haji Fadilah Haji Yusof said there are on-going R&D collaboration between governmental research institutions as well as between private sectors of both countries specifically on green energy from biomass and solar and this should be further enhanced. The Deputy Minister also conveyed MOSTI’s interest to cooperate in eco-labelling and nuclear R&D.

Both sides agreed that biomass is a potential area for R&D cooperation between the two countries besides bio-based chemicals, carbon capturing bio agents and bioremediation.

On the way forward, Dr. Kim also agreed with Datuk Fadilah for the setting up of a direct link between MOSTI and NSTC, with the International Division as MOSTI’s focal point.