The International Network for Government Science Advice held its Capacity Building Workshop in Buenos Aires, Argentina on 28- 30 June 2017. The workshop gathered around 60 emerging and established scientists, policy makers, and key stakeholders living or working in Latin America to enhance capacities in providing science advice for policy-making at all levels of government.
The event featured high-level speakers including Peter Gluckman, INGSA President; Robin Grimes, Senior Scientific Adviser to the UK Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Ernesto Fernández Polcuch, Head of the Scientific Policy Section of UNESCO; and Marga Gual Soler, Project Director of the Center for Scientific Diplomacy (AAAS).
The workshop sought to create a dialogue on models of science advice and promising practices for working at the interface between science and policy. In particular the agenda focused on:
1. Strengthening the capacities of researchers – scientific and technological – and policy makers to insert scientific advice into the process of designing public policies in multiple sectors (e.g. health, environment, natural resources, citizen security, among others) in the Latin American context.
2. Creating a Latin American network of actors in scientific advice that can serve as a platform for exchanging good practices and addressing challenges and solutions in their regional and institutional context.
3. Developing and disseminating the principles and guidelines on scientific advice contextualized in the Latin American region.
Our Regional Office participated through its director, Dr. Manuel Limonta who presented on characteristics, patterns and asymmetries of the Latin America region. Dr. Limonta was excited by the opportunity, trusting that “INGSA will have a positive impact in our region.”
The workshop was coordinated by the Ministry of Science and Technology of Argentina on behalf of the International Network for Government Science Advice (INGSA) operating under the aegis of the International Council of Science (ICSU), along with the support from ICSU’s Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean.
Presentations given by Peter Gluckman and Robin Grimes are available on the event site along with further information about the INGSA programme.
The next INGSA Science Advice Workshop will likely be held in Panama or Jamaica, pending confirmation, in order to better integrate other countries from the region.