Agenda for national, regional, and international S&T organizations

Included in this category are S&T unions and professional societies, as well as the InterAcademy Panel (IAP), Third World Academy of Sciences (TWAS), Council of Academies of Engineering and Technological Sciences (CAETS), InterAcademy Medical Panel (IAMP), and International Council for Science (ICSU) with its affiliated National Members, International Scientific Unions, and Scientific Associates.

1. Facilitate the effectiveness of research programs in developing nations

These organizations should promote the creation of centers of excellence - whether of local, national, regional, or international status - in each developing nation. For the S&T capacity of these countries to grow, the centers should have institutional autonomy; sustainable financial support; knowledgeable and capable leadership; international input (including collaboration with international institutions); a focused research agenda that includes interdisciplinary themes, applied research as well as basic research; and technology transfer; peer review as a systemic element; merit-based hiring and promotion policies; and mechanisms for nurturing new generations of scientific talent.
These international scientific institutions should be encouraged to help in the formation and strengthening of nascent national and regional entities. The participation of these international bodies in reviewing plans of research or operation of the nascent entities will help them establish the requisite standards and effective mechanisms of operation.
Encourage the creation of virtual networks of excellence (VNE) - research programs jointly sponsored and conducted by research institutes in different geographical locations, with research personnel communicating and collaborating primarily via new technologies such as the internet and the World Wide Web, deemed by merit review to be of the highest international quality in personnel, infrastructure, and research output - at national, regional, and global levels.
Virtual institutes-research programs undertaken by research personnel located in different geographical locations, communicating and collaborating primarily via new technologies such as the Internet and the World Wide Web - should be created. And they should be coordinated by researchers of exceptional scientific profile who are responsible for their scientific efforts and administration, and they should be housed at host institutions that provide adequate resources, both human and material. In the case of multi-institutional teams, other entities should also guarantee effective support for the project's participants in their purview.
These international scientific institutions should participate in partnerships and consortia for addressing research areas of potential local benefit. They should ensure that public-private research relationships do not impair the core mission and values of public research institutions.
These international scientific institutions should work across sectoral and national boundaries to help promote collaboration between research programs in the industrialized and developing nations, as well as among the developing nations. Scientists can play an especially productive role in articulating the imaginative proposals needed in different sectors.

2. Participate in providing scientific advice to developing-nation governments on scientific questions related to public policies and programs

These international scientific institutions should provide informed and reliable counsel to national governments on issues involving science and technology.
These international scientific institutions should actively participate in governmental efforts to assess and manage benefits and risks of new technologies and actively advise governments in assuring not only effective adoption of a new technology but facilitating implementation of public-health, human-safety, and environmental guidelines or regulations associated with its potential side-effects.
These international scientific institutions should encourage coordination of national advisory mechanisms between nations, as in the sharing of experience and the standardization of some types of risk assessment.
These international scientific institutions should encourage innovation and experimentation in disseminating the results of publicly funded research and in turning them into new products and services that address local needs.
The scientific community should pay serious attention to the news media and participate more fully in public debates and discussions. In such interactions, scientists should make an effort to explain scientific issues in nontechnical language.

3. Help developing nations to upgrade their educational institutions and programs

International scientific organizations should encourage the scientific community to participate as resources for providing high-quality training for science teachers. This will involve special efforts at all tertiary-education institutions, including research universities.
International scientific organizations Support programs for technology professionals and doctoral programs in the developing nations' best universities by offering long-term fellowships, with adequate stipends, to deserving young people who wish to do their training or at least spend some time in centers of excellence there. As an integral part of this experience, visiting professors from industrialized nations should help raise the level of courses and participate in exams and thesis defenses.
International scientific organizations should strengthen undergraduate-degree programs in science and technology, and enrollment in these programs should be stimulated through fellowships awarded to the best students.
International scientific organizations should encourage science academies and other scientific organizations to collaborate on activities such as teacher training and the production of materials needed for students' science education.
International scientific organizations should participate in doctoral-fellowship programs for foreign students, and then maintain the relationships, through scientific cooperation, after the students return home. One such mechanism for cooperation would be the availability of some of the scientifically proficient country's laboratories for collaborative research with scientists from other nations in the region.
International scientific organizations should provide information about sponsored fellowships and programs that support S&T capacity-building activities, as people seeking such opportunities may not be aware of them. Therefore a database of all such programs should be created and posted on a Website so that it is available even to scientists working in the remotest parts of the world.