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'E-infrastructures key to boosting Arab research output'
[December 06, 2011]

'E-infrastructures key to boosting Arab research output'


AMMAN, Dec 06, 2011 (Jordan Times - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Linking research and information centres across the region is key to increasing the volume of research in the Arab world and improving its quality, an economist said on Monday.



Talal Abu Ghazaleh, chairman of the Arab States Research and Education Network (ASREN), told reporters yesterday that connecting these centres through e-infrastructures (networks, data centres and other technological systems that aid research) will help them coordinate, and facilitate information and expertise exchange.

Methods to achieve that goal will be discussed next week at the first "International platform on integrating Arab e-infrastructure in a global environment", which will open in Amman on Monday.


The three-day event will group the region's innovators, scientists and business leaders, who will discuss policies for sustainable development in education, the integration of research networks, and the possibilities for a global e-infrastructure for research and education, according to Abu Ghazaleh, a former senator.

The conference will also direct the attention of decision makers, private sector leaders and researchers to the role of e-infrastructure in developing research and education communities in the region and encouraging scientific collaboration, he added.

"Arab nations are the weakest in the world in producing and publishing scientific research," Abu Ghazaleh warned, stressing that knowledge-based innovations are what "prosper in this era".

He said next week's event is also aimed at examining prospects of sustaining a research and education network across the Arab region and connecting it to similar networks in Europe, North America and around the world.

ASERN is a registered nonprofit association that seeks to implement and manage sustainable pan-Arab e-infrastructures to boost scientific research and cooperation in its member countries, according to a statement by the regional body.

The e-infrastructure projects currently implemented in the region are supported by the European Union.

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