Vietnamese science stands before unprecedented opportunities

The level of investment in science and technology in Vietnam is still low, but Vietnamese science is facing unprecedented opportunities with the support from the Party's and State's guidelines and policies.

The Ministry of Science and Technology has just organized a National Conference to implement the Science and Technology Development Strategy for the period of 2011-2020 with the participation of about 400 representatives of ministries, departments and central agencies and local; representatives of leaders of nearly 20 provinces and cities; scientists, research institutes, universities and science and technology enterprises.

Speaking at the conference, Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan said that although the role and position have been confirmed, science and technology are not really considered as the top national policy. Among the reasons given as social awareness about the importance of science is inadequate, the mobilization of social resources into science and technology activities has not been focused, the Deputy Prime Minister strongly accepts the work. Investment in science and technology in Vietnam is still too low compared to the world.

Deputy Prime Minister cited, the US each year invests 400 billion USD in science and technology, the number of people doing research is 1.4 million people. The second economy in the world is China to invest in science and technology 178 billion USD, the number of participants in scientific research is 1.2 million.

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan. (Photo: Nguyen Hung)

"Notably, Korea, a country of 48 million people, but the scientific investment is 53 billion USD per year, the amount of money they invest is bigger than the population. Vietnam has more than 80 million people, the amount of investment. Only $ 1 billion, so the intensity of Korea's 2-year investment equals ours for hundreds of years, "the Deputy Prime Minister stressed.

"Obviously, it is not by chance that Korea becomes a powerhouse," the Deputy Prime Minister said.

Deputy Prime Minister cited some other countries such as France, Italy, Russia are all countries with huge amounts of people and scientific participants."Since then to see all the major powers implementing a large investment policy for science and technology and there are many people working in this field very much," the Deputy Prime Minister said.

In addition to the limited amount of investment, the Deputy Prime Minister also pointed out that the existence of science has not had many outstanding progresses such as the process of developing plans of ministries, branches and localities with almost no components. 5-year science and technology development plan comes with the socio-economic development plan, so there is no basis to assign the task to the scientific force to serve the development of the ministries, industry, local. Not only that, the level of investment of domestic enterprises for science and technology is not much; the management of the topic is still heavy on procedures, not really attached to the output efficiency.

The Deputy Prime Minister proposed, in 2013, to complete the legal documents and frameworks related to science and technology, thereby serving as a basis for implementation in the following years. For localities, at the latest in the second quarter of this year, to complete the science and technology development plan from now till 2015, from the third quarter, concentrate on approving and deploying national products and boosting the national cooperation. sacrifice. In addition, the Ministry of Science and Technology should focus on promoting international cooperation on science and technology.

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan also stated that the Science and Technology Development Strategy for the period 2011-2020 will have to change the way of financial management for agencies, organizations and individuals participating in scientific research; for the research and deployment of scientific topics in the direction of managing scientific topics according to output products.

"There has never been a good opportunity for science of the country to be present with a series of policies and guidelines issued by the Party and the State on scientific and technological development , " the Deputy Prime Minister said.

The scientific and technological development strategy for the 2011-2020 period clearly defines the views, objectives, orientations of tasks and key solutions for scientific and technological development. The strategy emphasizes the goal of synchronous development of social sciences and humanities, natural sciences, science and technology and technology; bringing science and technology to become a key driving force, meeting the basic requirements of a modern industrialized country; By 2020, Vietnam science and technology has a number of fields reaching advanced and modern levels of ASEAN and the world.