The Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) of Israel and the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) of the Philippines virtually held the 1st Philippines-Israel joint committee meeting on innovation, science, and technology on June 30 to discuss and agree on the priorities and specifics of the collaboration.
MOST Chief Scientist Avi Domb expressed his excitement in pushing through the collaboration with the Philippines. He also wished that the two countries will have long-term cooperation and will continue to discuss and prioritize the areas. Artificial Intelligence (Robotics), Agriculture (Water Management), and Health (Biomedical Engineering and Drug Discovery) are the initially identified topics.
DOST Undersecretary for R&D Rowena Cristina Guevara conveyed her appreciation that the meeting is convened to discuss joint activities to be pursued under the umbrella of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on Scientific Cooperation signed on 03 September 2018. Undersecretary Guevara also emphasized that Israel is a valuable and priority partner for the DOST and hoped that the partnership will be fruitful and will benefit the people.
At the end of the meeting, the Philippines expressed its intention to send experts to Israel for training on drip irrigation systems, biomedical engineering and drug discovery, medicinal chemistry, among others. They also discussed joint development of AI applications for government or public service and emergency response. Both sides agreed to continue discussions on potential and priority areas of cooperation between Israel and the Philippines.
In attendance to the 1st JCM are the delegation from MOST headed by Prof. Avi Domb – chief scientist; Philippine delegation from DOST headed by Dr. Rowena Cristina L. Guevara – undersecretary for R&D; Philippine Embassy in Tel Aviv headed by Philippine Ambassador to Israel H.E. Macairog Alberto; representative from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Pnina El-Al – director, Culture, Education and Academic Cooperation Department; and Israel Embassy in the Philippines headed by Nir Balzam, Chargé d’Affaires a.i.
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