Three foreign delegations visited São Paulo to consolidate partnerships and increase cooperation with Brazil.
Germany’s Minister for Education and Research, Edelgarda Bulmahn, who was in Brazil to sign agreements in the field of education and technological cooperation between Capes (Coordination of Improvement of Higher Level Personnel and DAAD (German Academic Interchange Service), visited the Bioscience Institute of the University of São Paulo (USP), on November 3, to learn about the Center for the Study of the Human Genome and the Xylella Genome Project, sponsored by FAPESP and Fundecitrus. According to the rector Jacques Marcovitch, the purpose of the visit was to consolidate international collaboration and assess the possibility of reaching cooperation agreements.
In November 7, a delegation headed by Vincent Courtillot, director of Research at the newly created Research Ministry in France – split off from the Ministry of National Education, Research, and Science in March this year – was at FAPESP. The French people men came to reassert their interest in promoting the interchange of researchers or professor-researchers between the two countries. The idea of creating joint laboratories was debated, with headquarters either here or in France. “It could be a good idea”, said José Fernando Perez, scientific director of FAPESP.
Last year, the then minister of Education, Claude Allègre, had already visited São Paulo for the same reason. “There have been some structural changes to ministries in France, but we still come with the same message”, said Courtillot. “For us, increasing scientific cooperation with Brazil is a priority. We want to strengthen scientific ties will few countries, initial in a few fields”, he said, quoting genomics, biological information technology, environmental sciences, materials science, social sciences, and multidisciplinary studies of urban problems. The directors of FAPESP and the French delegation promised to choose two or three fields of common interest in the next few months to encourage new binational projects.
FAPESP and the Scientific Research Commission (CIC) of the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, were also preparing a scientific and technological cooperation agreement which should include the interchange of groups of researchers, carrying out joint research projects and the association between scientific and technological research with the productive sectors of the two governments.
The agreement is provided for in the Letter of Intent signed by the Science, Technology, and Economic Development secretary, José Anibal, and the director general of Culture and Education of the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, José Octavio Bordón, on November 9. The agreement is strategic and, according to Bordón, it is crucial to consolidating and strengthening the process of interchange between the countries of the Mercosur, as well as Chile and Bolívia. “We need to strengthen relations with Brazil, so that together we can build a stronger South America”, he maintained.
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