TEHRAN - Iran will participate in the 3rd Technology Transfer Award (TTA 2022), which will be held in Istanbul, Turkey.

The event will be hosted by the Scientific and Technological Research Institution of Turkey (TUBITAK) with the cooperation of the D-8 Technology Transfer and Exchange Network Secretariat, located in Pardis Technology Park of Iran.

The share of Iranian articles with international participation reached 30.5 and 34.2 percent in 2020 and 2021, respectively.During the TTA, the best technology transfer contract nominated to the secretariat will be awarded by the D-8 Secretary General and the D8-TTEN secretary.

Nominated contracts should be signed within a time frame from January 1st, 2021 to November 1st, 2022.

Contracts should abide by a technology transfer method and all science and technology fields are included.

Established in 1997, D-8, also known as Developing-8, is an organization for development cooperation among a group of developing countries including Iran, Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Turkey.

The objectives of the D-8 Organization for Economic Cooperation are to improve member states’ position in the global economy, diversify and create new opportunities in trade relations, enhance participation in decision-making at the international level, and improve standards of living.

Science diplomacy

Despite U.S. sanctions, the international activities of Iranian scientists have increased year by year, so that more than 35 percent of Iranian articles in Scopus have been multi-national projects, Peyman Salehi, the deputy science minister, has said.

In 2021, Iranian scientists published more than 77,000 scientific articles in the Scopus database, so that, Iran has been ranked 15th in science production, he said, IRNA reported.

The country also ranked 15th and 16th in the world in terms of scientific references, he added.

Data from the Scopus International Citation Database show that Iran’s scientific diplomacy has reached more than 34 percent since the beginning of 2021, the highest level in the past 20 years.

Science diplomacy is the use of scientific collaborations among nations to address common problems and build constructive international partnerships. 

It is a form of new diplomacy and has become an umbrella term to describe a number of formal or informal technical, research-based, academic, or engineering exchanges, within the general field of international relations.

In 2011, the share of Iranian articles with international participation was about 16.5 percent, which increased to 19.7 percent in 2016 and gradually in the following years, so that in 2020 and 2021, reached 30.5 and 34.2 percent, respectively, he added.

The share of Iranian articles with international participation has had significant growth of 209 percent during an eight-year period (2013-2020), becoming the Islamic world’s leading country in science diplomacy, according to the Scopus International Citation Database.

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