The webinar completed another action item for the Science and Technology Working Group (STWG), under the U.S.-Ukraine Strategic Partnership Commission. Officials from the State Agency for Science, Innovation and Information (SASII) and over 15 key members of Ukraine’s scientific community gathered to attend.
The webinar was a key result of the STWG to address Ukraine’s desire for better access to international scientific databases.
SASII, the V.I. Vernadsky National Library, Ukraine Institute for Scientific, Technical and Economic Information, Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, and the Institute of Veterinary Medicine were among the institutions gathered at the Embassy’s DVC facility.
Speakers from the international scholarly society IEEE, the publishing company Thomson Reuters, and the U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation (CRDF) made presentations in response to the Ukrainian request for information about international scientific databases and the requirements for the publication of Ukrainian research projects.
The event was organized to support the push of Ukrainian institutes for competitiveness on the international academic market.
Access to scientific databases can determine an institute’s success and increase the chances of published research to be considered for international patents.
Today, universities worldwide are increasingly ranked according to the publication/citation rates of their professors and researchers, and Ukrainian scientists naturally want to compete with their peers. Ukrainian institutions are in the game on a global scale to attract the best students, to earn a good reputation and maintain their prestige, and publication rate is a ranking criteria.
In addition, the market for locally-driven innovation is primarily outside of the country’s boundaries, which makes the competition to earn international patents more critical.
In addition to being a concrete result of last year’s STWG, the web seminar successfully demonstrated the commitment of both countries to work together toward advancing science in Ukraine. We all look forward to the next steps!
Posted by Gaia Self, Economic Analyst for Environment, Science, Technology and Health at the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv. Blogs of the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv can be found at http://usembassykyiv.wordpress.com/
