(Part 4) 11th Multi-stakeholder Forum on Science, Technology and Innovation for the Sustainable Development Goals

Good afternoon, everybody, and welcome back.
And I'll call the fourth meeting of the 11th annual multi stakeholder forum on Science, Technology and Innovation for sustainable development to order.
I would like to welcome all participants to this third session of the 11th SDI forum, another very insightful session.
This session focuses on shaping the future of science, technology and innovation for sustainable development in times of uncertainty and change.
We are meeting at a time when STI systems are undergoing rapid transformation.
Technological breakthroughs, geopolitical tensions, climate risks, and economic disruptions are reshaping the global landscape for research, innovation, and international cooperation.
Science, technology and innovation remains central to addressing global challenges and accelerating progress towards the SDGs.
At the same time, emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence present both significant opportunities and complex risks, including challenges related to governance, equity, and trust.
This session will explore how STI systems can better anticipate and respond to systemic risks and opportunities in this evolving environment.
We'll examine the role of international cooperation, science, diplomacy, and governance frameworks in shaping innovation pathways that are aligned with sustainable development.
Our discussion will be structured around two themes.
Strengthening international SDI cooperation for the SDGs and advancing action on emerging SDI issues in the age of generative artificial intelligence.
We will reflect on how strengthen foresight, we will reflect on how to strengthen foresight, build trust in science, address key trade offs and ensure that SDI systems support resilience, equity, and sustainability.
I encourage you to consider how we can work together across disciplines, sectors, and borders in order to shape a more inclusive and forward looking SDI agenda.
In this session, we shall also have some innovator pictures.
We shall begin with this session three on shaping the future of science technology innovation for sustainable development in times of uncertainty with Innovator Pictures.
I am pleased to welcome our first innovator, Masaki Omenda who will represent SOR Health Intelligence Room.
We have her here.
Transform lights from the sky, turning environmental sensing data into actionable intelligence for the climate adaptation in the global cells.
It's a great honor to have this opportunity here.
My name is Masaki Umeda, Director and Deputy CEO from SRA Technology, Japan.
SRA Health Intelligence Room is an AI driven platform integrating drone, satellite, and hydrologic chming to generate climate risk focused.
Our AI identifies high risk hotspots, not only linked to climate disasters such as flooding, but also for climate sensitive infectious diseases such as malaria, denga, choleraa and others.
Our strengths in particular lies in provision of practical action list.
For example, we can help the community health workers on the ground understand when and where the actions will be needed, with what kind of intervention? From was related sensitization for the community into proactive proportioning of vector control against malaria and mosquito boorne diseases.
We operate over ten African countries, starting from Ghana and Kenya, expanding more under the partnership with UN agencies like WHL, UNICEF, UNDP, and others.
We aim to redefine public health system from reactive response into anticipatory data driven, climate informed action that scale through the partnership.
Thank you very much attention.
Thank you.
Linda for his presentation.
I now invite miss Win Liang from China, who will present via prerecorded video, Aqua Sentinel.
Can you play the video? Hello.
My name is A Quan Li, and I am from B International School Guangzhou.
Imagine billions of gallons of clean water waste every year vanishing through undetected leaks in our aging infrastructure.
Yet, this is just the first half of a global water security crisis.
In China, vast river networks are poisoned by illegal and untraceable pollution.
This is not merely data.
It is the drinking water safety of tens of thousands of people as they compromised by heavy metal contamination.
Today, we introduce the answer Ag Sentinel, the world's first bioinspired AI global robot.
Instead of the threat strusors we use proprietary neural networks to predict turbulence and adjust bionic films in milliseconds.
I compare passive mode with AI counteracting the turbulence against my active AI mode.
But in active mode, the transformer neural network predict the wave patterns and instantly adjusts the lateral films to counteract them.
The results were dramatic.
The neural network reduced the range of drift to just 27% of what it was with CD AI.
Furthermore, the standard deviation of the robot's position accessibility matrix was reduced to just 30% of the past mode.
We aren't just building better robots.
We are creating the only complete way to operate in the world's most productive waters.
I represent we digitalized and g airdrops.
Thank you.
We thank Lang, Mr.
Lang, and we now hear from Suluma Muttali From Zambia, also via prerecorded video, we will present a e waste recycling.
You can play the video.
Hi, my name is Tulum Bam Tale, Innovations lead at Tara ES recycling plant.
Africa is not just facing an ES crisis.
We are building a solution.
E waste is one of the fastest growing waste streams in the world.
Across Africa, discarded electronics release toxic substances such as lead, mercury, and cadmium.
These pollutes our environments and put vulnerable communities at risk.
Much of this E waste is handled informally and ends up in the landfills.
We are addressing this problem through our Zema certified, engineering driven ES recycling system designed for value recovery.
Our innovation uses locally developed technologies, including a crusher and an innovative shaker table to safely dismantle electronic waste.
Through efficient, low emission processes, we recover variable materials such as copper, silver, and reusable components, turning waste into a resource.
Our impact is measurable.
For every turn of e waste recycle, we reduce pollution and carbon emissions.
We protect public health and create green jobs for young people.
We also engage communities through schools, workshops, and awareness campaigns, building a culture of responsible recycling.
This innovation contributes to the sustainable development goals.
SDG six by reducing water pollution, which may come from e waste litt.
SDG seven through our transition to renewable energy.
SDG nine by advancing sustainable industry and innovation.
SDG 11 by creating cleaner cities.
SDG 17 through our strategic partnerships.
Our vision is to scale this solution across Africa, transforming EST into opportunity, protecting lives, and building a secular, sustainable future.
A.
Thank you very much.
We thank Mr.
Chuma Mutale of Zambia for that lovely presentation.
But please join me in recognizing all the innovators for their presentation with a round of applause, please.
Thank you.
We now move to the panel discussion for this panel number three.
I am pleased to welcome our distinguished guests, speakers and participants who are in the frontier and now hand over the proceedings to our moderator, Mr.
Tony Marsilis, Chief Content Officer of GZ Data Media.
Thank you so much, Ambassador.
I really appreciate that.
It's always exciting to be here at STI.
I'm glad to be back.
As I often say, you can't spell fun without UN.
Hopefully we'll keep this lively, informative, and most importantly, helpful at this critical time for the world.
I thought actually the ambassador did an excellent job of setting the stage for what this conversation will entail.
We're living in this world of competing realities and I actually participate in these kinds of conversations all the time.
You've got science systems that are expanding and bringing huge potential and possibility, but only for those who are included in that growth and development.
We want to get to the heart of a central question for this forum.
How can we ensure that STI remains a public good, one that serves sustainable development, inclusion, and resilience rather than further fragmentation and inequality? The panel conversation We're going to look at this from two different lenses.
First, STI systems are under pressure.
Some might even say under assault.
Trust in institutions is eroding, governance, funding, we all know the problems.
Then second, we want to move from insight to action on a conversation I keep hearing so much about without hearing a lot of super concrete actions to take, which is the need for greater AI diffusion.
AI, as we all know, is moving faster than any other technology in history.
But the gap is widening.
I remember the New York Times right around Davos calling it a yawning gap.
We want to make sure we can close that yawn considerably, and we're going to talk about ways to do that.
To set the stage for us, it is my pleasure to invite up for a framing presentation, Mr.
Carlos Enrique Brito Cruz, Senior Vice President, research networks at El Sever, and co chair, of course, of the ten member group of high level representatives.
Take it away.
Thank you.
Thank you very much for the opportunity, Mr.
Co Chair, moderator.
So my task is to highlight to you one aspect of the changes in science and technology in the world that I feel are are positive and relevant for the conversation.
I must apologize for bringing something that I feel are good news because usually people like to talk about not being on track, we are not going to make it and this and that, which is true.
There are many things which are not going well.
But I feel that the changes that we see in the world of science today signal some opportunities.
And the main one is that the center of gravity of science in the world is moving from the richer countries towards the poorer countries.
Low and middle income countries, which are countries where the per capita income is below $14,000 per year, have now more authors of scientific publications of good scientific publications than high income countries.
This has never happened in the world before.
Always we were used to a world where ideas in science would come from North America or Europe.
And now many, many ideas, relevant ideas are coming also from the global South.
So this is what I show in this chart.
The one on the left shows how the number of scientific publications has been growing in the world.
And the lower chart shows bars describing what's the growth rate, which for the last ten years was about 4.9% per year for the whole world.
Now, when you separate the world in two parts, high income countries, which is the middle panels, and the low and middle income countries, which is in the right, the green, you will see that the growth rate, the orange bars, all the scales are the same there.
The orange bars are much below the value of the green bars.
The growth rate of publications, scientific publications with authors in high income countries is now at a rate which is about 1.8%.
W for low and middle income countries, it's close to 10% per year.
That reflects the fact that those countries, low and middle income countries, have been doing something that in this room here has been talking about for many years, capacity building, creating the capacity to train their own scientists, to send them abroad, to create universities, national laboratories, and have people capable of participating in the international conversation about science and research.
Now, counting by number of authors, those two charts are showing you.
The one in the center shows you in the red line that the number of authors in low and middle income countries is now clearly higher than the number of authors in high income countries, but not only that, it's growing at 10% per year, while the number of authors in low and middle income in high income countries is growing at only 5% per year.
So that means this gap is going to increase, which is natural because low and middle income countries were behind in science.
They didn't have the institutions, the people, the training.
And in the last 50 years, they have been busy developing and building that.
If you look at the chart on the right, that groups the authors in countries or regions.
China, of course, among the low and middle income countries is the main one.
It's the blue line there.
They have now about more than 3 million authors of research publications.
Then in second, there is what I grouped here as the 28 low and middle income countries, excluding China, the 28 larger low and middle income countries.
Those would be India, Brazil, Russia, Turkey, Indonesia, Iran, Mexico, Malaysia, and several other countries.
They compose now the second larger number of authors of scientific publications.
Then in third, you have the Europe of 28, which is Europe plus the UK, and then the United States.
This is, as I insist with you, a big change in the world.
This is about the past.
It's not about papers written by AI.
It's not about predatory publishers.
It's about decent reasonable publications in scientific journals which use a peer reviewing scheme.
Now, if you look at the SDGs, this number of authors reflects in that.
If you count the publications which have authors in low and middle income countries and target any one of the SDGs, you'll see that as of 2023, more than half have authors in low and middle income countries, which means what? It means that those countries are finding their way to study and discover the solution to their own problems.
Of course, collaborating with the world as everybody does, but it's important to have your local capacity in order to be able to collaborate and use the best of what the scientific collaboration can bring to you.
Again, similar to what I have shown for the SDG related publications, China is then the low and middle income countries 28, then Europe of 28, which is losing share, not because Europe is publishing less, but because the low and middle income countries are publishing more and are growing their number of authors.
And the same for the United States.
If we consider, for example, by SDG, the green line shows what share of authors low and middle income countries had 12 years ago, 2014, in each one of the SDGs or writing papers about each one of the SDGs.
And the blue line shows how it has expanded.
In most cases, it's above 50%, in some cases, it's not, but it's trending towards that.
So this is something that we should consider when we think about the world.
And I'm insisting that because it happened to me somehow we think that the world of science is the same world of science where we got our PhDs, which was like 40 years ago for my case.
But it's completely different, completely different in terms of distribution of capacity.
There are many instances, I have shown to you one where low and middle income countries are progressing.
There is one where they still have work to do, which is in what relates to basic research.
Because many times priorities, most of the times, priorities in research are moved by necessity.
Those countries advanced more, for example, in SDG related research, which is a good thing, and advanced less in their capabilities in basic research.
But they need to do that too.
They need to do that too because basic research is about creating the foundations on which you will be able to build the solutions to the problems we still don't know we are going to have.
And the richer countries in the world have been doing that for a long time.
I put there in the left a list, I don't know Fermat Li theorem, which is the basis of modern cryptography, Maxwell equations, when Jacques Mono found mRNA in 1960.
I mean, nobody knew what mRNA would be used for.
And then 70 years later, he became the basis for the vaccine against COVID.
CRISPR, basic research, touring computing machinery and intelligence at the roots of artificial intelligence, quantum mechanics and electronics, semiconductor, several others.
Relativity, the theory of relativity, which has to be considered to make the GPS you have in your sports watch work.
If they wouldn't account for relativity, the position in a GPS system would be wrong by 11 kilometers per day.
So it would be difficult to make a run.
Anyway.
And then I will finish by showing you that one way to look at that at this disparity is by looking at the main funders in the world that fund explicitly basic research.
They are built, they work to select basic research.
And I look at what share of the publications they fund is cited in patents by the main companies in the world.
Later on, six, seven, eight years after.
This looks at a period of papers published in 2018 and 2020, those three years.
And you will see, for example, the European Research Council, I see the president there, Maria, is the biggest one.
About 11% of the things they fund are used in a patent somewhere in the world.
Then Belgian Foundation for Research, the Swiss National Science Foundation, National Science Foundation of the United States, and the four ones in orange at the end are the ones which are in low and middle income countries.
The first ones, then there is a long tail in the chart, but they are NRF from South Africa, the Sam Paula Research Foundation where I worked in Brazil, the National Research Council of Brazil, and the National Organization for Training Higher Education personnel in Brazil.
But you see that there is a lot to do to climb this mountain of making of selecting research that will be more used.
Of course, one thing that is against low and middle income countries in this aspect is that they do not have too much industry that uses the research because they are still developing their industrial system.
There are two things that contribute.
In conclusion, I wanted to highlight to you in terms of the shaping of the research system in the world, that low and middle income countries have now much higher growth rates and much larger systems than they had 50, 40, 30, 20, whatever last year.
They are growing and they are growing faster than high income countries.
The growth in publications is driven by growth in the number of authors.
More authors can tackle more teams in sustainability related research.
Clear advance 2014-2024.
It And finally, some of the challenges, the linkages between academia, corporate, and government sector needs strengthening in low and middle income countries.
They need to exploit much more of the opportunities we have seen that this morning about global south global south research collaboration.
They have to find a way to maintain a good balance between applied and basic research.
And finally, the fact that the advances in low and middle income countries have not, I hope, yet, being reflected in the international implicit and explicit governance of research.
The composition of committees, for example, the IPCC makes an enormous effort.
They changed their composition, but they are still do not have didn't reach 50% of the members of IPCC coming from low and middle income countries, but they are progressing along that line.
Editorial boards, multilateral research advice.
So there are challenges, but there were important advances, many of them happened because of things that were discussed in this room ten, 20, 30 years ago.
Capacity building is working.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Stay right there, actually, if you don't mind, I'm just going to ask you a follow up question and let you sit down before I move on to the others.
That final point that you made, first of all, the whole presentation was fascinating and it runs what I loved about it.
So counter to this narrative that's out there right now about AI, specifically, that the yawning gap that we talked about, this is a place where there's a bright spot happening in low and middle income countries.
But that question of governance is very important.
So how do we close that gap and what concrete step can be taken to make sure more researchers from those countries have a seat at the governance table? I would think that the first step is to recognize that this change exists, that it is a fact.
I don't know how many times I have talked to people in Europe and North America about this and they said, No, it's not happening or they say it's only because of China, but it's not.
It's widespread among several countries in low and middle income countries.
So the first thing is to recognize that this is a fact and then facilitate the interactions that will lead to participation.
Thank you so much and please come and join us on the panel.
Turning now to Mr.
Robert Dietraf, president elect of the International Science Council, and so much more as well.
I mean, you've worn just about every hat in science and on the government side, as a minister, being a scientist, I want to just invite you to share how you view science, technology and innovation right now in these challenging geopolitical times.
Thank you so much, Chairman and your excellencies, ladies and gentlemen.
It's a great pleasure to represent here the International Science Council, which we all as the most comprehensive organization representing the global science community.
And I want to echo the words of Professor Britta Cruz, you know, we should be excited that never before in the history of science, so many have joined the research community and that we have so much tools and technologies to make really this global community feasible.
So we should be optimistic, but on the other hand, there are also stresses in the system.
I want to briefly bring you in the past, in the 1950s when we had at the height of the Cold War tensions, there was a proposal to study to do something remarkable, let scientists from all over the world, from rival nations study the Earth as a whole system.
And in fact, seven years later in the 67 countries did exactly that was the International geophyscical year.
The result was not only major scientific breakthroughs, including the launch of the first satellites.
You see one if you enter the main building here in the headquarters, but also actually one of the most successful examples of science enabling diplomacy, the Antarctic Treaty.
And I think that story matters because we live again in a time of growing tension, of geopolitical fragmentation.
The multilateral system itself is under pressure, and I think the many challenges before us, whether it's climate or pandemics or biodiversity or technology regulation, are all inherently global.
And I think that's kind of the paradoxical situation we are in.
All our major challenges require cooperation, but incentives are increasingly national.
You see nations looking at science and technology through the lens of economic competitiveness, of national security rather than science as a global public good.
And I think that's the topic that we're discussing here.
I would like to say international scientific collaboration is one of the few forces that pushes in the opposite direction and bring nations together.
Not out of idealism, but actually out of necessity.
Actually, no country can understand the climate system or manage health risks by itself.
Science and multilateralism are actually kindred spirits.
We have the same approach to the world.
And so the question is not whether cooperation is our interest, it clearly is, but how do we sustain it in these kind of difficult times? I think this means, particularly also that the science system itself has to change.
We need more equitable partnerships, as we just heard.
We need to strengthen scientific capacity globally, and we really have to protect science as an open system with a shared infrastructure.
And that also by the means science diplomacy as an important force.
I like to say that governments and intergovernmental organization are sitting in the first ring of the geopolitical theater, a little bit of political splash zone.
And we scientists sit in the second ring where we can do less, but also can do more.
We can contribute expertise that transcends political boundary.
We operate on longer timescales, and we build trust that can outlast political volatility.
But science itself is also under stress.
Moderator, you already mentioned this, you know, there is trust is contested.
Misinformation is spreading, sometimes disguised as science.
And at the same time, expectations are rising.
So I think safeguarding science demands more than just defending it.
It also requires renewing it.
Become more inclusive, more open, engaging with society, with decision makers, and not only to produce knowledge, but actually make sure that it's translated into real action.
There should be truth in advertising in science.
And this is actually being reshaped by rapidly advancing technologies.
Artificial intelligence is one, but all breakthrough technologies are currently shifting from standalone tools to embedded systems that will govern any part of our lives, including the life of the United Nations for all the mandates here.
And so it's not the issue whether these technology will advance, but how is their trajectory governed? If we are not making deliberate choices, we risk deepening the inequalities to concentrating capacities and fragmenting knowledge system.
So I think there is a great challenge for the international scientific world to keep science open, trusted, and truly global so that it serves not only our national interests.
In fact, I think it's important that governments get convinced it is in their national interest to collaborate.
I think science, in that sense, again, I echo the presentation of Professor Britta Cruz.
It's the most reliable source of optimism.
Thank you.
Thank you.
If I can just ask you a follow up as well.
Yeah.
I think that last point that you touched on is so important that this is more than just philanthropy certainly and even more than just investing in scientific discovery.
For in many ways, it's a national security issue.
Do you think that people, governments are beginning to truly understand the security implications of health security? Yes, I like to say that the real challenge for governments and the world is to navigate to risk.
One is to be paranoid and close off too much and the other one is to be naive.
I like to say usually governments are paranoid.
But they are largely paranoid about scientists being naive.
I think one thing that really this time demands that scientists and with deep expert knowledge are involved in all the decisions that have to be made and that's something new for the scientific community.
That means that geopolitical issues will be part of the working life of many scientists.
I think that's another challenge, but I think we can do this.
Thank you very much.
To my left here is an Sun, who is a UNESCO chair for STI Innovation Policy and Director and Research Fellow of Science at the Science and Technology Policy Institute in the Republic of Korea.
We have heard the word trust a few times already, and I'm just curious at this point when trust in institutions in general is eroding, how the scientific community confronts that.
Thank you for the questions, Attorney.
My job as a policy analyst is to identify emerging and critical issues at the intersection of science and science and technology and international relations.
In that regards, STI for SDG has been one of the major topics that I have focused on over the years.
If you ask me what the most dramatic change in the recent global research ecosystem, what I observed is right now is how we perceive science and technology.
Science in particular, used to be universally viewed as a public good.
But today, it seems to be increasingly treated as national strategic assets.
The reason is that the lines are blurring.
The distinction between basic science and applied technology or between curiosity driven research and dual use technology is no longer clear cut.
And looking at the general purpose technologies like AI, they can be used for the greater public goods, but also for a dangerous purpose as well.
So because of this, the governments are stepping in and they are using public R&D funding as a leverage, asking universities and researchers to monitor their international network, report to foreign partners, and conduct due diligence sometimes before making international partnerships.
And academics worry that this securitization of science and technology may hurt academic freedom and open science.
But I think regardless whether we think this is good or bad, it is our new reality we are actually facing these days.
Universities and labs are no longer just Ivory towers.
They are the frontline of strategic technological competition.
Because they tend to conduct more and more research with economic value these days.
So where are these attentions most visible today? Definitely in the critical and emerging technologies, things like AI, quantum, and synthetic biologies and extra.
The fields will fundamentally change how we live in the future.
Naturally, every country develop or developing countries, they all want a seat at the table.
So this leaves us with a very tough question, how we balance promoting this research with protecting it.
There is no simple right answer.
But here is what we do know.
Science is inherently international.
From setting a research question to peer review, publishing, patenting, researchers constantly interact together globally, and no single country, no matter how technological advanced country, can dominate the entire life cycle of research and innovation.
So I think international collaboration is not an option.
It's a must.
But in this era of intensifying technological competition makes achieving the SDG much more complex.
So what should we do to keep moving forward? I believe we need to focus some specific actions.
First, we have to go back to the fundamentals to rebuild our scientific trust We need to restore the core values within the scientific community itself, namely research transparency or integrity and mutual respect among researchers, institutions, and their research ecosystems.
Second, we need a new alliance, I think.
What I can say science policy, but science diplomacy, science diplomacy, but a science policy diplomacy, I would just say.
We always talk about science collaborating, but we urgently need robust international network among science and technology policy experts as well.
We need the people who design the governance and funding systems to talk to each other So we can break down national institutional barriers so that our researchers can collaborate freely without constantly worrying about potential risk of their collaboration activities.
Thank you.
Thank you so much, Chung.
And if I could just ask a quick follow up on what you've shared.
So do you feel there are enough scientists that are already at the table and having governance conversations, and how would you get to a place where there's a sufficient number so that they're well represented in those decisions? Oh, no, I don't think that's not enough because, um, When we discuss about the SDGs and global challenges and SDI for SDG, most participants are from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs when it comes to the government structures and the main line ministries.
But I think that um In addition to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, I think Ministry of Science and Technology, which actually has the rear resource like R&D funding and the expertise network, they have to be more involved in the global discourse on the SDG, so they have to be more engaged in sitting on the table.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
In our introductory presentation from Professor Brito Cruz, we talked about the importance of emerging markets.
It's a perfect segue to Anjani Fouill, founder and CEO of Jeness Solution.
You really represent a new generation of tech entrepreneurs building solutions in emerging markets, not necessarily in Silicon Valley.
I'd love to open the floor to you on what the global tensions we've been talking about institutional roadblocks mean to you and how to overcome them.
Thank you very much.
It's my honor to be here.
It was interesting to hear what Mr.
Carlos mentioned about the shift of publishing papers and how it is actually increasing.
At least me, I haven't actually thought from that statistics perspective.
It was very clear.
I would like to relate that with movement of technology as well.
In the past, it used to take longer time for technology to move from where it evolved to emerging territories in South Asia or in African countries as well.
But now I think the moment is overnight.
A large language model developed tonight is going to change the entire world tomorrow as well.
Again, miss Sun mentioned some of the advanced technologies like quantum computing, the res, the funding as well.
Now, myself working in UK, but originally from Nepal and as a company working across South Asia and Africa, I got a good opportunity and chance to travel these territories, interact with private and public sectors over there, to make sure they use the technology that is already being developed out there for public good, for betterment, for automation, for making service very efficient.
What I realized on the ground Countries, again, they have immense challenge on moving very fast, balancing modernization, but then the resilency question is very, very high as well.
Strong pressure on moving quickly on AI and digital transformation to remain economically competitive.
But again, affordability is a big question.
Cybersecurity is another big challenge as well.
Are the institutions ready? That's another big thing.
Again, public trust.
Who is building this technology? Where is the data going to reside as well? Again, the challenge on long term dependency on external systems, for example.
One of the major challenge is that technology capability alone does not automatically translate into developing outcomes.
In many cases, the gap is not just technical, it is institutional and structured.
Tooling and technology, as I mentioned, developed tonight.
It can be transmitted overnight in a couple of hours or even in minutes and seconds, for example.
But the real roadblock is on the policy framework, government system, long term digital strategies, which, again, the evolution is very, very slower than technology itself.
Many countries, again, they tried to replicate the system that is working in some of the larger economies without understanding the differences in the industrial maturity, the financing capability as well, and implementation readiness.
Again, one of the major trade off is speed versus resiliency.
Again, another is national priorities versus global cooperation.
Increasingly, the challenge is no longer simply access to information.
It is equitable access to infrastructure, capability, governance, and meaningful participation.
The gap, if not used in different territories is going to be much, much wider.
But again, if common baseline is being followed, the best practices that worked in one territory can be replicated and customized for another territory.
I think there is a greater opportunity now than ever to reduce the gap, much lower as well.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Thank you, John.
That was great.
So, as we've already discussed, science is becoming more global, also more contested, collaboration is essential, but increasingly complex and governments are struggling to keep up.
We're going to turn in just a moment to really dive into AI, which let's face it, is the topic that I hear most when I go to these convenings these days.
But first, I do want to play a short video from a participant of ours, Maki ants, who is Group Executive Innovation and Transformation telecom from South Africa, who sent us a video speaking specifically to the issue of inclusion.
Take a look.
Distinguished guests.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for the opportunity to be able to present to you today.
My name is Maggie Jenks.
I am a computer scientist from South Africa.
I also serve as a head of innovation, where my work focuses on the intersection between technology and society.
My work is also anchored on the quadruple helix model that in essence looks at the role that private sector, that universities, that civil society as well as government can play in strengthening and advancing STI systems.
As we look to shape the future of science, technology and innovation, recognizing rapid change that comes with emerging technologies, we must confront a critical reality.
Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence do not simply erase the digital divide, they inherit it.
ITU defines universal and meaningful connectivity as the ability for everyone to access quality Internet, which requires these foundations, quality infrastructure, ownership of personal devices to be able to access that Internet, affordable Internet, fast speeds that allow people to access and leverage connectivity, and the requisite digital skills to not only be able to consume what's on the Internet, but to use it meaningfully to impact the users.
While the Internet and many other technologies have brought several benefits to people across the world, there are structural realities of access with 2.2 billion people remaining offline, predominantly in low and middle income countries.
For many countries, the barriers to being able to fully utilize and leverage emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence are often structural.
On this slide, we see the various challenges that are experienced in the rapid growth and expansion of artificial intelligence with a high concentration of compute power concentrated in the global north.
Many countries also lack the energy and grid power required to sustain high performing computers.
Equally, there is a need for human capital skills that power up the AI economy.
Data centers are often also found largely concentrated in the global North.
While we face various infrastructure challenges across the world, these challenges are not a reflection on how many global South countries have been able to leapfrog and innovate with emerging technologies to advance STIs.
On this slide, we reflect on the pace of adoption of AI, often being seen being rapid, largely in global south countries.
For example, in Nigeria and India, 80% of work has regularly leverage artificial intelligence at work, outpacing counterparts in the global North.
While it is important for foundational infrastructure to be in place for countries to be able to leverage emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, we also need to reflect on the rapid pace of evolution of AI towards a gene AI.
This evolution encourages enabling policies that allow the establishment of local regulatory sandboxes that promote partnerships across sectors.
This empowers local communities and societies innovate using these emerging technologies to address their local needs and utilize and leverage emerging technologies towards attaining SDGs.
Thank you very much for the opportunity to present to you.
Thank you to Macky for that video which really helps lay out the stark numbers that we're talking about here.
When we're talking about AI diffusion, but you still have a couple billion people on the planet who don't have reliable Internet access, that delta is getting bigger and bigger.
I'd like to turn now to Wang Jian, who's been waiting patiently.
You didn't just study the Cloud, you helped to build the infrastructure around it as the founder of Alibaba Cloud and now director of Sha Jiang Lab.
Let's start right there.
I mean, When we look at AI, how is it possible, given the numbers we just heard from May, that it becomes a tool to help sustainable development and not one that just certainly widens further this gap that we see? Yeah.
Thank you.
As a scientist, just echo Carlos and Robert, I really want to share yesterday one of the definition of the AI, actually I like very much and goes back to actually to the late in the late 40s, last century, and everybody knows Turing, but most people know the Turing machine or Turing test.
But actually, at that time, Turing once said in a report to the UK government, and he basically said that a human with pen and paper and rubber put some los is effectively a universal machine.
So that's the first time Turing talking about universal machine.
So I always joked with my colleagues, you know, our brain is great, but without pen and paper, we can't do anything.
And so for me today, AI is more like another more advanced pen paper, and I work together with our brain to do some great things, okay? So that's my view about the AI.
And the difference is, you know, with the traditional paper, we printed we print the book, but with AI, we actually print the knowledge.
It's a tremendous difference.
So it is very capable in some sense.
And also, I want to mention about what's the status about AI today? Today actually log n model is really a buzzword.
It's almost equivalent to the AI.
But what you can see today is much more go beyond the logic and model.
So the largest is AI model.
For example, what you can see that actually an AI system could do the programming, and that actually people who is not a program can do the programming.
But actually, the model behind that is much beyond the traditional large grant model.
So in this area, we always say don't chat program as the text.
We can traditional articles as the text, but never treat the program as the text.
So it's very different.
So one of the things that are working right now is make sure the scientific data instead of the text data could be part of the AI model.
Again, I would say actually is very capable today and it's still advancing very quickly.
And the second thing to mention is really about AI is more than just the technology itself.
And actually AI today is as fundamental as mathematics.
So we know that there's a word called STEM, science technology engineering and math.
It's interesting.
You can see we put the math behind that.
Actually, math it's kind of science in some sense, and we did, having a very serious discussion with my friends whether math is a science or not.
If it's part of science, why we put math behind this science technology engineering, and we conclude that actually math is something that actually unify the science technology engineering for science technology is math.
But today, things are changing.
The AI is becoming as very fundamental as the math.
What I want to put today when you're talking about science technology engineering, you have talking about math and you have talking about AI.
And they have talked about public facility and the public is getting much more important and just like the ISC is very committed to the science as a public good.
Whenever you have AI and you have public facility, basically we had to make sure the AI is for public good.
It's changed a lot.
It's more than just one vertical discipline.
Even more important today, when we're talking about AI model, we have the open model and closed model.
And sometimes we call the open model as an open source model.
There's the different perspective when we call an open model as open source model because it's not a source code anymore.
And so I would rather call the open model today is an open resource model.
Think about any AI model behind that is electricity, and the computing power.
So I think when you have the open AI model, it's really help to make sure that the more broad adoption of AI technology around the world.
Certainly it brings a new challenge in terms of security and some other things.
But anyway, this really bring AI to the more people.
So I think it's whether it's closed or whether it's open, then we have to think about how we can develop AI technology.
So in this sense, for the private sector for the companies, probably most of people working on this what we call the closed model.
And so I really encourage you know it's non profit research organization that are working on the open source model, that will help other people.
Certainly, the government could play a very critical role in terms of governance of the AI.
The last thing I want to say is really about, you know, with all these new technology for the SDGs, and it's really brings some new frontiers more than traditional technology we can have.
And look at the challenge we have for the SDGs and another United Nations put together a space technology program before.
And today you can see the synergy of the space technology plus the AI is a very promising technology could help to reach the SDG goal that we set for the Earth.
So again, this is a time that actually not just having a AI technology, but it actually open a lot of new frontiers for us.
More important with this public facility, with the open mode then gives us the opportunity that actually reduce the divide among the different countries and different regions because it's more accessible, so the AI isn't a technology.
If you can use it well, then we can reduce the divide.
But if you didn't use the well and you widen the divide.
So I think at least, you know, from my commitment is to make sure the AI will reduce the divide among the different regions.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for that.
I want to turn back to Anjani actually, because we heard the importance of open models, which also implies, by the way, a conversation about skilling, we hear about investment.
What do you think are the key components to scale AI in emerging markets? Again, when I hear about cloud computing, that's what I've been working from the last 15 years working with Amazon AWS, Google, Microsoft, Alibaba, Huawei and all the tens in Cloud of the world as well.
The fundamental is going to be infrastructure.
Again, there's a disparity challenge.
In some of the developing world, these are more of a commodity.
User sign up as a SaaS platform, have access to any of the model in a fingertip itself.
But again, that's where I reference back to the policy challenge.
In other territories, developing territories.
Again, because of lack of policy, the data residency challenge and those kind of things, even though those models are right out there and that actually solves a lot of problem, people cannot use it.
The access to technology is being barred, for example.
That's where, again, key infrastructure, primarily data center, data entry is not needed if there's a right policy on leveraging Cloud computing, for example.
That's the first component.
The second component is the institutional readiness.
Again, in some of the countries we hear, the government has given free access to, let's say, when we talk about LLM on the consumer, it comes as a GBT, but then it could be anything.
Now Cloud is there and then various other platforms are there.
There are these nations where they provide it as a basic access to their citizens.
But then there are these countries where buying these subscriptions are I would say Bard, or I mean, I come from Nepal, one of the example and that resonates to so many countries.
In Nepal, using international dollar card to buy the subscriptions is not possible.
I just recently, the government has given access to two, 300, 400, $500 per year to spend on these technologies.
Now, thinking of getting access to these technologies, which is right there in the pocket in US or European countries, I mean, that's another challenge as well.
Again, the third challenge that I would mention is sustained investment in local capability.
Again, these international technologies, it comes with expertise uses, and if local workforce is not trained to use these technologies, it doesn't become sustainable as well.
Again, I would like to highlight these three as important metrics for uses of AI in developing economies.
Thank you for that.
Robert dif, if I can just come back to you as well.
We're talking about the use of AI for SDGs, but how can the UN and other systems be better using AI to create solutions rather than just providing tech tools to the people that they're helping? Yeah, I think this actually was a core conclusion that the Scientific Advisory Board, the UN Secretary-General in their horizon scan recently gave, is that these technologies will not only grow and will interact, but actually will have an important role to play in basically all the missions of the UN.
If it's reacting to global crisis, whether it's providing support, whether it's logistics, all of that will actually be, uh, heavily could be heavily, you know, increased and could be optimized using these kind of technologies.
So it's not only something that, you know, the UN plays an important role in the governance.
So I'm very happy to see this as independent panel because, you know, we worry about this rapidly accelerating technology and it's not enough to have a break on it, but I think we need the steering wheel and we have heard, there are many, many choices to be made.
But I think it's also very important for the whole multilateral system to realize that these technologies can actually strengthen the role of the UN itself, its governance, and thereby also many of all its agencies, by the way, so that we get a better response to the many crises and challenges that the world is facing and where I think the UN has an important role to play.
Thank you for that.
In Chung, I love that notion of, I've heard it before, does this have brakes, this system? I like the steering wheel notion too.
That's a quintessential question.
Is AI moving faster than governance? I think the answer is probably yes and I'm not a scientist.
But from your view go ahead.
Yes, sir.
I think you are right.
You know already my answer.
I don't want to be so negative, but to be blunt, yes, we are already behind, but we have to accept a fundamental reality in science and technology or innovation policy.
Governance is almost always designed to lag behind innovation.
Um, innovation moves at the speed of technology, but governance moves at the speed of consensus, and consensus takes a lot of time.
So there are some risks related to this.
I see two major risk connected to this recently intensifying technological competition.
First is the risk of regulatory fragmentation, Because building international consensus takes time, many nations are naturally developing their own AI rules tailored to their domestic priorities.
While understandable, this patchwork of regulations creates complex compliance barriers and make it increasingly difficult for researchers on the ground to collaborate across borders.
The second risk is unintended over securitizations.
When governance systems are still evolving, governments understandably prioritize safety and precaution.
With mature framework for general purpose technology like AI, there is a tendency to lean on national security measures.
While well intentioned, this can lead to restricted data flows and reduced researchers mobility, potentially closing the doors on open science.
So this is exactly why I emphasized earlier science policy diplomacy.
So creating a single unified global AI framework or law may be highly ambitious given our diverse national interests.
However, we can ensure that our respective AI framework are interoperable.
We need policy experts to actively align these systems, ensuring that we protect our societies without unintentionally stifling the global research innovation ecosystem.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Before we move to high level respondents and then of course, after that, open it up to the floor, I want to close this portion, at least, back where we started.
Professor Britt Cruz, if I may come to you.
There's obviously so much enthusiasm and so much money to be both had and made around these rapidly developing technologies.
But how do we keep the focus on basic scientific research and make sure that that doesn't suffer? Yeah.
Well, the challenge there, it's not to put one thing against the other.
Actually, the way I see it, countries need both.
The thing is to reach an adequate balance between what fraction, what share of your available funds you are going to spend in basic and how much you are going to spend in applied or in technology.
One way that many countries use to help this is to rely more on the business sector for things related to apply it and to technology.
Low and middle income countries are learning how to do that, and they are progressing along this way.
But you see in richer countries, I just read the other day that Amazon or Google spend more in research than the whole of the German government.
So there is money there, right? Thank you for that.
Heading now to high level respondents that we have with us and good segue research because we have Maria Lepton, who is the president of the European Research Council.
It's great to see you again, and I yield the floor to you push the green button.
No.
Okay, good.
Yes.
Well, this was an amazing and interesting roller coaster between optimism and a positive outlook and concerns, glass half full, glass half empty.
Let's start with a glass half full.
First of all, thank you, Carlos Enrique Britto Cruz, for the call out on the importance of fundamental science and the ERC, of which I have the honor of being the president and I take no credit.
I just represent the ERC a with them having the largest share of citations in patents.
That value of fundamental science, I think we all see here.
I can add a little bit of good news to that and that is that industry does recognize that.
It's just some of our politicians who don't.
That's good news.
The pledge to internationality, your son said, science used to be a public good, now it's a national asset, but we are inherently international.
I think we share all that and I think we're doing our best to protect that.
I've been recently reading Madame de Sales from the beginning of the 19th century.
She was banned from France for having praised within France the achievements of writers in Germany and Italy.
She was banned for that from France and she said, ironically, shall we build a Chinese wall around France to protect ourselves from the influence of the ideas in Germany and France? I think we're being forced sometimes to do the same here.
Building walls is not going to protect us, it's going to protect us from influx of knowledge into our own economies.
I'm happy to see the pledge to internationality here.
Um, Increasing participation of lower and middle income countries, that is wonderful.
Really good news.
I love to see those data.
Very exciting and I would actually love to hear from the countries that are concerned whether they see it in the same way.
But at the same time, we've heard from everyone, Ajani and March Danchz about the inequity.
That is clearly a remaining challenge.
My feeling of bad news is that we're in a bit of a bubble here.
We're talking to each other.
We tend to agree.
I just did a survey of my family, Oxford educated, UCL, London educated, MIT educated, Imperial College educated, left leaning liberal.
None of them know what the SDGs are.
These are top educated people, and never mind the famous man or woman on the street.
I think that's where our big challenge is.
We've got to get out of our bubble.
Um, Robert Dykraf has said science as a system has to change.
Brito Cruz has said science has changed since we all got our PhDs, and I think we have to take that into account.
We may be the wrong ones.
So we have to turn to youth.
They are the ones for whom AI is natural.
They are the ones who inherit the world, and we've got to do something to hand power over to them to deal with these problems and to engage them.
The most important thing is that really everyone realizes what we're on about here.
Maria, thank you.
If I could just ask you a quick question just because something you said piqued my interest and reminded me of a conversation that was very ongoing in Munich at this year's Munich security conference related particularly to cybersecurity and this growing push towards sovereignty and not wanting to rely on outside acts, including the United States, obviously.
Are there similar debates and discussions happening among the scientific research community and where does your head fall on the balance between sovereignty and collaboration? As always, always on the side of collaboration, but I think Robert said it without being naive.
Some of my colleagues are naive and we all know it.
Anybody who is a researcher knows if we go to conferences, do we talk about our very latest frontline news results? My students and postdocs used to ask me, are they going to steal my ideas? I say, if you don't share your ideas, you're not going to get feedback.
Be aware with whom you share them.
I think the same is true can be said for countries.
We have to be open without being naive.
There are times when it's important to protect our intellectual property and not display it all, but the fundament has to be openness and sharing.
If not us then who Thank you for that.
Let's turn now.
I think immediately to your right is Elliott Minsberg, is that correct? Minchberg, Director of UNESCO's liaison office in New York, UNSCO representative, of course, to the United Nations.
We've talked a lot about STI for the SDGs, but what about governing the SDIs for the SDGs? Well, thank you, Mr.
Moderator.
It's just a pleasure, first of all, to join you for this conversation, and I'd like to start by thanking the distinguished panelists for setting the stage so eloquently.
Many of you work with UNESCO already in different capacities, and we have opportunities to engage, but I think this conversation is very important.
As Maria said, we should definitely go beyond the bubble of the UN and talk with everyone.
That's what we're trying also to do at UNSCO in general, is to bring everyone to the table, the private sector, definitely the academia, but also the civil society and the people we are supposed to serve and to support.
Um, to your question, STI systems, as we know, are under pressure, but they are full of opportunities in this rapid change world.
Looking back at the past year of UN system work, we have identified three or four priorities that I could share here today.
First, the need for reliable data on STI systems.
It's essential to enhance the transparency of investments and policy making and to strengthen trust in science.
And that's a very important point.
Many developing countries, as we have heard, face challenges in producing reliable STI data and in building the statistical foundations for sound policy.
At UNESCO, we work actively to close this gap.
Through our Institute of Statistics, we help countries in measuring their R&D expenditure and human resources, and more specifically on AI, we have developed a tool which is called the readiness assessment methodology on AI, which supports countries to assess their readiness and identify institutional and regulatory gaps on AI, including across technological infrastructure, and social dimension.
There are already 109 countries implementing this tool.
It's very practical.
It is a way to translate basically the norms, and UNESCO was the first UN agency to have an international norm on the ethics of artificial intelligence.
So this readiness assessment methodology is the translation basically of the norm into practical tools to assist and support countries to assess the gaps.
Um, equally important, our UNESCO science report provides a global picture of how science systems are evolving around the world.
So that's the first point.
The second point is that there is increased demand for supporting policy implementation and monitoring and learning.
We work with different partners, including Unktad and UN Merit, to provide training on STI policies for the SDGs, policymakers and we've done that over the past year in over 110 countries.
Those are again, very concrete programs that we try to implement.
We also support countries in mapping their STI policies, instruments, and institutions, building the evidence based they need to monitor and improve them.
And this is the role of the global observatory of STI policy instrument, the gstpin that we have put together.
It's a mapping of the policies and it provides best practices and lessons learned.
But as I mentioned, policies also need normative anchors.
And some of the panelists mentioned that the importance of norms as well.
In 2021, as I said, UNESCO member states adopt the first ever.
It remains the only truly global framework on ethics of artificial intelligence.
And most recently last November, our general conference adopted a global standard on ethics of neuro technologies, which is, as we know, the next big conversation that we should expect at the UN.
We're still not talking about it, but it's coming quite soon.
The last point I want to make is that there is growing recognition of the need for STI system to be more, as was mentioned, more inclusive, more equitable, open, and closely aligned with societal needs.
We have a recommendation on open science and on science and scientific researchers, which provide a solid framework to help guide this transformation.
It's based on one simple principle, scientific knowledge belongs to humanity and should be accessible to everyone.
Um, and last but not least, in March 2025 linked to the question of cooperation, we convened the first global ministerial dialogue on science diplomacy, and the message that came out of the conference was clear science must serve peace cooperation and collective progress.
Finally, and I'll stop here, I want to make an important point, of course, that some mentioned as well, is the importance of education.
Of course, as the agency in charge of promoting SDG four, the SDGs are not necessarily known, but the topics are and education is clear and when we do surveys around the world about which topic is among the most important for people, they very often respond education.
Strong STI systems are built on strong STEM education on classrooms that prepare young people not just to use the technology, but to create the technology.
This is why UNESCO is investing in upstream, supporting countries and strengthening STEM system from the earlier stage.
We also support teachers, and that's very important to emphasize the role of teachers to train the teacher, including in AI and robotics, ensuring they are equipped for today's realities.
And as I said, this journey, therefore, begins on the benches of school, It's the use indeed on those benches who will stand at the forefront of STI.
Those use will shape the future as we know.
Thank you for the question.
No, thank you.
A lots there that's piqued my interest.
First of all, the first two high level respondents both said most people don't know what the SDGs are, which I think is interesting.
But certainly, as Elliott just pointed out, everybody knows what the problems are.
If you ask people to name what the top ten or 17 big issues are in the world, they're certainly going to know or get pretty close.
We might talk in a bit about the importance of education around the SDGs.
But, as I said, piqued my interest when you talked about neuro technologies and some people nodded their heads and other people didn't.
For people who might not know exactly what you're talking about, just define exactly what you mean in this context.
I think that's a question for some of the experts on the podium.
I'm happy to turn that over to someone here who wants because I just want people to walk out of here and be like, Wait, what? What do I have to prepare for next? Go ahead, Doctor.
If I could here.
It's an interesting point because as Maria said, there is this thing about the bubble, right? We are here we talk about SDGs, six, five, two, and so on.
If I would go to my family too, David would probably not know about SDGs, but they know about real problems people face.
They know that you need to produce clean water, spending less energy.
They know that you need to produce energy, creating less carbon.
The thing about the SDGs, I believe, to a certain extent, is that the UN, when they created the SDGs, they were smart to think about real life important problems and put them in little boxes 1-16.
But the problems existed before and they exist today.
It's just a matter of not talking to people about, how do you feel about SDG 13 and talking to them? How do you think our country is doing efforts to control emission of carbon and so on.
It's talking about the thing, not about the label.
Thank you for that.
I guess we're going to save neuro technologies for another time, but go ahead, Elliot.
I was hoping that one of the scientists could step in here because that's not very well.
I would prefer to be accurate when it comes to answering that question.
But basically, that's the science that connects to the brain basically and that's all the robotics around in the connection between robotics and the brain.
There are a lot of applications to that and many of the private sector companies are already working on this very actively and that will have impact on the work that we're doing and challenges, as we said, for any new technology, but also opportunities as well.
Thank you for that.
Dietrich Vander Vicken hello, General Manager, Global Sustainable Technology and Innovation Community, G Stick from Belgium.
Take it away.
Hi, good afternoon and thank you, moderator, for giving me the floor.
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen.
I'm representing or I'm speaking on behalf of two hats I'm wearing.
First is the SIC community, indeed, but I'm also working for Veto, a technological research institute in Belgium with a strong focus on sustainable development since the very beginning of our existence about 35 years ago and at that time, it was quite unique, to be honest.
I will try to make a few points that add something to what has been said.
A lot of things have been mentioned already, of course.
What I tried to do is summarizing some of the key message that emerged from the annual conference.
We are organizing now for the ninth time this year, very similar to the SdiI forum, but hosted by a network of research organizations and we are working closely together with the UN and the different stakeholders in the whole ecosystem.
After every conference, some of the key findings emerge from the different discussions and I try to summarize them in the context of the panel of today.
The first one is that SDI has become a political issue, not a neutral one.
We see that Science, technology and innovation are no longer just technical topics.
They increasingly shape geopolitical power, economic competitiveness and social legitimacy, and choices about AI energy systems, health technologies, and so on, decides who benefits and who gets left behind.
So the real question today isn't how fast innovation moves, but who is steering it, for what purpose and under which rules.
Secondly, I think it's important to emphasize that the SDGs shortfall is a systems failure, so not a lack of innovation.
So systems thinking is no longer optional.
It's essential for governance.
And across the conferences we hosted on four continents, the same message keeps coming up.
We already have many of the solutions we need, but there is a persistent gap between what is possible and what actually gets implemented.
And that gap is not driven by a lack of innovation, but by fragmented policies, disconnected financing, sectoral silos, and insufficient international cooperation.
So the bottleneck is really system readiness and not technology readiness.
And of course, because sustainable development cannot be delivered through single technologies or sectors, governance has to reflect the deep interconnections between energy, water, food, health, and so on.
So systems approach is not optional.
It is essential, and it aligns also with the integrated nature of the SDGs and shifts the focus from inventing new solutions to redesigning the systems that allow existing innovations to deliver real equitable impact at scale.
Another point is also related to trust and was mentioned a few times.
We see that equity and trust have become hard constraints on innovation.
In the past, innovation was held back mainly by a lack of knowledge, funding or technology.
And today, one of the biggest constraints is trust.
And when innovation feels imposed from the outside or benefits only a few or disconnected from local needs, it creates resistance instead of transformation.
And this is especially clear in low and middle income countries where scientific capacity is growing, as mentioned a few times, but influence over decisions and global research agendas remains unequal.
And of course, in the current geopolitical context, there is a bit of lack of trust as mentioned, and it will take time to rebuild that trust.
But unfortunately, it will also cost money and the funding is already scarce, but I'm hopeful that we will get somewhere.
And as proposed by Brito, recognize that fact and also facilitate interactions at different levels is really crucial.
Now, finally, a small remark on AI, and that's the last point I want to make.
I think AI is a powerful amplifier, but not the solution on its own.
AI and generative AI can greatly improve decision making foresight and productivity, but they can also amplify bias, exclusion, and power imbalances, and their impact depends less on technical sophistication and more on governance, transparency and how they are embedded in the real world system.
AI doesn't automatically solve sustainability challenges, unfortunately, but it amplifies the strengths and weaknesses of the systems it's built into.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for that.
Yeah.
It reminds me of Brad Smith, who's the president of Microsoft wrote a book called Tools and Weapons.
All technologies are both and it depends on how they're deployed by humans.
Rob Robert from UNDP, we spoke last year and a lot has happened in a year, hasn't it? How are you viewing this conversation, which seems to me like access to these technologies, access to technology systems is becoming increasingly important in development.
Take the floor.
Yeah.
Thank you very much, moderator, Tony.
It is great to be with you again and the fascinating overview from the panel, which, of course, highlights the importance and critical nature of the multi stakeholder part of the STI forum.
Yeah, you could say a lot has happened since last year and I was reflecting actually a couple of days ago on how much has happened since this forum was created as well, how much the dialogue has changed.
There is no question.
We see more than ever the potential opportunity for technology and AI to accelerate the SDGs.
I think everyone in the room pretty much agrees on that.
We did a study a couple of years ago with our partners ITU, looking at the 200 odd targets of the SDGs and identifying can be accelerated with technology and found that over 70% of the SDG targets can benefit from technology if it's applied appropriately.
There are still fundamental challenges.
Despite the fascinating insights from the panel on things that have been accelerating out of the low and middle income countries and they are, we are still not quite seeing having some of the fundamental challenges being addressed at a country level in many different places.
And so we very much see that if we are not, and this is to the previous speaker as well, the point made about AI in particular seems to amplify inequalities unless you are actually very much paying attention to directing AI and the usage of AI in a direction that is inclusive and safe for people overall.
Um, so I wanted to share a couple of observations coming out of the work that's been done with UNDP over the last year, particularly with AI.
And first on some of the observations that come out of our country based work.
So we have digital programming going on in 130 countries worldwide.
Over the last year, we've worked intensively with over 25 countries on the discussion around AI and looking at national ambitions and looking at building national roadmaps around AI.
Um, we consistently see a few challenges come through.
One is that ambition level far exceeds the capacity of institutions to actually manage this.
And so the steering wheel that we talk about, that is a little shaky in a lot of places.
The second one is that data systems tend to be siloed, fragmented.
That is a limiter or to the ability to adopt AI in an accurate way in a maximum impact kind of way.
Third one, we see governance is on paper, but not always in practice in many countries and gets a little bit at that institutional issue, but we really need to push toward practical application of policies that have been adopted, not just adopting policies.
Fourth one is particularly a government issue when it comes to procurement of digital technologies and particularly AI, the systems are lagging behind.
And then the last one that I would highlight is that the capacity gap and the financing gap are still very real.
And so when we look as UNDP on what we try to do to address these challenges, there's a few things that I'll just mention and then I'll close.
One is actually directly related to your point, Dietrich, on taking a system approach.
There are some things when it comes to adoption of AI, technology in general, but particularly AI that have to be done at an integrated level.
They cannot be driven by an individual sector or an individual ministry or an individual institution in the country.
They have to be addressed at an integrated and cross cutting level and so we need to connect the dots.
We need to work very upstream and in many cases, UNDP has supported countries to pull together inter ministerial commissions or national AI cabinets or the structures that can help connect the dots between ministries.
Then we work on those cross cutting or very transversal policy layers, strategy layers, safeguard layers and things that really have application across every part of government and then society.
On the issue of capacity building, this is an area where we have been working in around 40 countries on digital capacity building or AI capacity building over the last year.
We started working with parliaments and see a huge interest in parliamentarians on understanding how to be or how to make laws when it comes to AI.
They have to understand the issue.
We've taken in a few places governments away in retreat settings for boot camps on AI.
There was one country in West Africa where we brought together 17 ministers in an off site that was directly mandated by the president.
Um, and so really looking at these opportunities to get policymakers, decision makers, lawmakers up to speed.
And then in a more general sense, working with partners like ITU, we collaborate with UNSCO as well and others on, how do we really scale the available um, offerings for policymakers or civil servants to understand the opportunity around AI and digital technologies in general.
Then the last piece is the partnership and collaboration piece, which has come up again in the panel as well.
This is where we have worked over the last year to implement a G seven initiated program called the AI Hub for Sustainable Development, that is focused on the African continent, and it really looks at how to bring private sector partnerships into African ecosystems to make AI more utilizable or address some of those challenges.
We've also brought together a group of over 50 different actors across private sector, civil society and government in something called the Hamburg Declaration on Responsible AI.
This is connected to the Hamburg Sustainability Conference, and it tries to set out a set of principles that we agree on when applying AI to the development space.
Then of course, we work in support of the UN overall effort around the AI policy dialogue and scientific panel and other efforts that are going on globally.
Um, and then just one final thought, and I'll end there.
Um, We have to speak globally because we are at a global level event and we need to see the trends.
But the real work hits at the ground level at the point of every country, institutions, universities, et cetera We really the way we look at this is we start at a global level to understand, but we really have to be present on the ground when it comes to understanding how a particular context is able to adopt this.
We can't be one size fits all with these things, which is why we have to be really calibrated.
We had a launch event yesterday as part of the STI forum um, sponsored by the Government of Singapore and UNDP, where we released a report called SIDS 2.0 S Island developing states, but actually we call them small Island digital states.
There are particular things about the context of small island states that require particular policy practice responses as well.
So we really need to get into that individuality or the particularity of context.
Thank you very much.
Thank you so much, Robert A.
Now it's a great time for interventions from co chairs of the first global dialogue on artificial intelligence governance, one that will convene on the sidelines of the STI forum next year.
It's my honor to introduce Her Excellency, Edrisalda Lopez, who is the permanent representative of El Salvador.
Thank you very much for inviting us to participate in the session today and for giving us this opportunity to contribute to this important discussion.
We believe that this discussion is intrinsically linked to what you mentioned about the preparations for the first international conference on AI governance that is going to be taking place this year in Geneva on the sixth and 7th of July.
As we've heard AI is a growing part of the broader discussion on science technology and innovation, but it also raises important questions for development and cooperation, institutional capacity and the way in which different societies and economies respond to technological change.
Over the past month, the El Salvador and Estonia in our capacity as co chairs have been engaging with member states and the whole United Nations system together with relevant stakeholders through consultations and exchanges, not only here in New York, but also in Paris and Geneva.
And we've also been using virtual regional formats to do this.
We've been thinking about what one of the speakers mentioned earlier about the importance of moving outside of our UN bubble when we address topics that are so significant for humanity like the SDGs, and expand to which is like AI.
I would be interested in and understanding that we have undertaken the greatest efforts to ensure that this dialogue is not only inclusive but action oriented.
I see that I don't have too much time left, but I wanted to highlight a number of things in relation to our proposal.
We think that this dialogue should reflect distinct national and regional context, the differing levels of development and institutional capacities, but also policy approaches, which is also one of the things mentioned by one of the speakers.
But dialogue also has to have a practical approach.
It has to help us share experiences, lessons learned, and possible areas for cooperation giving that There are initiatives and discussions about AI governance that are already underway.
In our view, this is precisely the value of the global dialogue on AI because we can provide this platform within the framework of the United Nations where we can bring different experiences and different perspectives.
This can come together in a more structured and more constructive way.
In other terms, this can be a dialogue of dialogues.
It's not another layer over the top to substitute existing efforts, but rather it can be a dialogue to help us better understand other activities, other efforts in the area of AI and to identify complementarities and to really support a more connected conversation under the auspices of the UN.
But I also want to be very clear as I conclude co chairs.
This doesn't only depend on the dialogue for 2026.
We already know that there's going to be one in 2027 under the framework of this forum.
The success of This dialogue depends on the entire UN system that needs to work in a more connected way, in a more transparent and action oriented way, not just as an independent entity, but the United Nations as a whole, but also we need more member states to be more committed to this and to the future of AI governance and we look forward to your support and to the other stakeholders who are present here.
Thank you very much.
Ambassador, thank you so much.
And just a quick message that if you are part of a delegation wishing to take the floor, please indicate.
But before we go to the floor, I'd like to invite His Excellency, Mr.
Rain Tomsar, who, of course, is the Perm Representative of Estonia, to the United Nations to speak, and I see you in the back there.
Indeed.
Thank you very much, Excellency, dear colleagues.
I wish, first of all to than I would say to congratulate Austria and Zambia for convening today's, I would say clearly successful thematic session free of the 11th SDA forum.
You have heard my co chair, Ambassador Lopez, with whom we are working very closely on the progress made and the current stage of our preparations when it comes to our first global dialogue on air governance.
Allow me to offer free reflections on the proposed thematic clusters and structure of two dialogue.
Next phase of preparations and consultations and the importance of continuity, indeed, that was also briefly mentioned by Ambassador Lopez.
First, with our mandate under the AI modalities resolution firmly in mind and guided by the valuable feedback from member states and stakeholders, we have published on our website an updated note most recently revised on 5th of May, outlining proposed teams and structure for the global dialogue to be held in Geneva, indeed on sixth and 7th of July.
In designing the dialogue, we have sought to create a genuinely multi stakeholder space, one that enables meaningful interaction and practical exchange among governments, the private sector, civil society, academia, and technical communities.
To encourage focused, yet cross cutting discussions, we have organized a program around four thematic clusters that in essence represent a compressed version of a seven topics prescribed to forward dialogue by the modalities resolution.
Its AI opportunities and implications, bridging AI divides, safe, secure and trust for AI, and respecting, protecting, and promoting human rights.
A longer version is available on our website.
To ensure these discussions are rooted in evidence based science, we welcome the presentation of Independent International Scientific Panel's first annual report on the day one of the dialogue.
Now, secondly, as we move into the next phase of preparations, our focus will be not only on logistical arrangements, but also on ensuring substantive and inclusive engagement on the themes before us.
To that end, we are convening an additional series of consultations with both member states and stakeholders for thematic deep dives on the most recently updated note.
Just for information that member state consultations are scheduled for tomorrow, Friday, May 8th, and Wednesday, May 13th, while the global virtual stakeholder consultation will take place on Tuesday, May 12th.
We are also engaging at the regional level.
Actually, I was supposed to be in Osaka right now, but later this month, we will participate in the ATX summit in Singapore to gather perspectives from Asia Pacific region, and we're exploring additional opportunities for regional engagements in the lead up to July.
Finally, thirdly, and finally, indeed, throughout our consultations, another message has come through clearly and consistently.
The importance of ensuring continuity between dialogue in 2026.
Building a bridge towards the second global dialogue, which will take place here in New York in May 2027 on the margins of SdiI forum.
We have to deal with this and indeed UN as a whole approach will be really important here.
As a co chairs, we have been mandated to prepare a co chairs summary.
Following the July meeting, this will not be negotiated outcome document, but rather a reflection of a discussion, experiences and best practices and insight shared during the dialogue.
In a rapidly evolving and fragmented global landscape, we believe there is a particular value in building coherence, strengthening complementarities, and learning from existing initiatives rather than duplicating efforts.
We believe a global dialogue can serve as an inclusive platform indeed to advance that objective.
Bringing together member states and stakeholders to exchange best practices, identify common challenges, and foster greater understanding on AI governance.
We therefore count on your continued engagement and support in shaping this process and ensuring its success.
Thank you for your support.
Thank you, Ambassador.
I'd now like to open it up to the floor.
If it's a question, keep it brief and tell us who you're directing it to.
If it's a statement, you will have a time limit of 2 minutes.
I thank you in advance for your cooperation because I think a lot of people want to join this conversation.
We'll do our best to work through them over our remaining time.
Let's begin with the United Kingdom.
Thank you, Chair, and thank you panel for sharing your insights today.
As we approach 2030, there is a clear opportunity to harness the rapid advances in science and technology to drive progress against today's most pressing global challenges.
Digital technologies are already reshaping economies and societies and are a key accelerator for progress towards the sustainable development goals.
Grounded in a strong commitment to human rights, the UK is focused on harnessing science, innovation, and digital technologies in ways that are inclusive, safe, and centered on human dignity.
We recognize that no country or sector can meet these challenges alone.
In May, the UK, with South Africa, the Children's Investment Fund Foundation, and British international investment will co host a global partnerships conference in London on the future of international development cooperation.
This is about rethinking development cooperation for a new era, bringing together governments, investors, innovators, civil society, and using modern collaborative approaches and new technologies to deliver the SDGs faster and more fairly.
We also know that progress must be locally led.
Our AI for Development program is partnering with 13 responsible AI research labs to support AI policy, talent, and innovation across Africa and Asia.
Governments have a critical role to play in ensuring advanced AI is safe, secure, and beneficial.
The UK AI Security Institute and International AI Safety Report are advancing the global evidence base necessary for effective governance.
In closing, the UK will continue to work with partners across regions and sectors to harness science and technology for a sustainable future.
Thank you.
Thank you, sir, and I yield the floor now to the representative from Cuba.
President Chair, science, technology and innovation represent a key pillar for the implementation of the 2030 agenda.
In this regard, we underscore the importance of bolstering the means of implementation.
They should be adequate, including financing, technology transfer, and capacity, capacity building, especially in developing countries.
Similarly, governance of emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence must be inclusive and transparent and state led.
Cuba has historically opted for developing science and innovation as part of its development model.
We have recognized capacities in areas such as biotechnology, in the industry, pharmaceuticals, agriculture and disaster management.
However, these efforts are being seriously constrained because of the economic, commercial, and financial blockade imposed by the United States.
In the current context, this policy has been intensified with an energy stranglehold that is directly impacting our capacity in science, technology and innovation.
It is limiting the functioning of research, infrastructure, and processes to ensure the future of SGI at a time of uncertainty, it is absolutely essential that we strengthen multilateralism and international cooperation and solidarity.
The United Nations system, including the technology facilitation mechanism and this forum must continue to play a central role in promoting dialogue, coordination, and knowledge exchange.
I thank you.
Thank you for that.
And now to a stakeholder, conference of NGOs in consultative relationship with the United Nations or Congo.
Thank you, Chair, Your Excellency.
The statement is on behalf of the Conference of NGOs in consultative relationship with the United Nations or Congo.
At a time of profound uncertainty and rapid technological change, civil society must be value driven and courageous.
Science, technology and innovation will shape our collective future, but only ethical governance will determine whether that future is just, inclusive, and sustainable.
Congress General Assembly unanimously affirmed that ICT and AI must serve human dignity, human rights, and the common good, not exclusion, exploitation, or unchecked power.
ICT and AI must be treated as global public goods, governed by inclusive, multi stakeholder processes and designed to close digital divides, particularly for the global South, women, youth, persons with disabilities, and marginalized communities.
Congo calls for robust rights based regulation of AI aligned with UNESCO's AI ethics recommendation, the Global Digital Compact, and the UN commitments on trustworthy and responsible innovation.
Algorithmic mixed systems must be transparent, accountable, and free from bias.
Speed and efficiency can never outweigh justice, care, and long term public value.
Civil society's role is essential, holding institutions accountable, embedding gender justice and ecological sustainability into digital systems, and ensuring technology strengthens both digital security and human security.
The future must be human centered by design, by governance, and by choice.
Thank you.
Thank you for that point and turning now to Mexico.
I would like to thank our distinguished panel for this absolutely fascinating discussion.
I think the most concrete thing on the way in terms of the UN framework is the global dialogue on the governance of AI on the horizon.
Of course, it is also historic in many senses.
I'd like to ask all of the panelists the following question.
From your perspective, what do you think should be the role of dialogue in this complex international environment and how can it be useful to build those bridges and to build trust internationally? We have heard a lot that dialogue is supposed to foster interoperability across the different systems that exist.
I wanted to ask, what does this mean for each of you and what outcome do you envisage when you hear this word interoperability? Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Turning now to Costa Rica.
Thank you, moderator.
Distinguished colleagues, I'm speaking on behalf of the co chairs of the Group of Friends of Human Security, namely Costa Rica, Japan, and Senegal.
SCI holds immense potential to achieve the SEGs.
Indeed, the appropriate use of SI in various fields of human activity could significantly contribute to improving people's living conditions, advancing freedom from fear and want, while protecting the dignity of people at the same time.
However, developing countries still lack equitable and meaningful access to SdiI that could bridge development gaps.
Access requires safeguards, particularly for emerging technologies like AI.
Otherwise, the risk of deepening inequality and eroding social cohesion will persist.
For these reasons, ensuring a beneficial integration requires a human centered SdiI governance agenda.
It is essential not only to strengthen international cooperation to improve access to SEI, but also to formulate holistic and preventive policies to avoid the risks of mishandling SEI within our societies.
Here, we underline the relevance of the human security approach as a practical tool available to member states adaptable to national context without prescribing or interfering with national policies or practices.
It aims to ensure that every individual can live free from fear and want by protecting and empowering people through human centered, comprehensive context specific and preventive measures.
As GA resolution 66-290 adopted by consensus stipulates, human security is based on national ownership and must be implemented with full respect for the principles enshrined in the UN Charter.
Consequently, promoting human security remains independent of any political agenda.
Thank you so much for that and now to the United Nations Environment Program, UNEP.
Thank you for the floor.
Excellencies, distinguished delegates.
The world faces a web of interlocking crises, climate change, biodiversity, pollution, conflict, hunger, poverty, economic instability.
Together, they amplify the risks, accelerate uncertainty, and expose critical gaps in how we generate and apply knowledge.
This year's forum moves us exactly in this direction, a shift From a science and technology and innovation is a static input to SDI is a continuous anticipatory system that helps us navigate complexity and shape change.
SDI must do more than deliver solutions to drive growth.
It should deliver solutions that promote a healthy planet as the foundation for development, peace and security, and the realization of human rights.
It needs to enable decision makers to anticipate systemic risks, promote synergies and interconnections, close knowledge gaps, and act early while unlocking opportunities for transformative, inclusive development.
At UP, the shift is already underway.
We're repositioning how we approach and apply SDI as a strategic action oriented function at the heart of decision making.
Moving from reactive analysis to anticipatory foresight and from siloed expertise to integrated systems thinking in line with the integrated nature of the 2030 agenda.
We're strengthening the usability and uptake of science and ensuring that evidence is timely, policy relevant, and accessible.
Equally, we're broadening the foundations of evidence, knowledge, and SDI, integrating indigenous local knowledge, behavioral insights, and citizen science alongside advanced data and digital tools.
This is essential to building trust, legitimacy, and real world impact.
We're also advancing a new foresight digital platform to enable more agile continuous scanning of signals of change, helping to identify potential disruptions earlier and strengthen anticipatory action.
Approach to science must be Thank you so much.
Now, handing it over right here, front and center in front of me, the Russian Federation.
A very good afternoon, distinguished delegates.
I'm here representing St.
Petersburg State University, the oldest in Russia.
It's over 300-years-old and which counts amongst its graduates, ten Nobel laureates, two fields medalists, and three Russian heads of state.
In 1990, the chancellors of key global universities Published the Talois Declaration, which underscored the environmental conscience of academia, universities and their readiness to mobilize efforts and resources to promote environmentally friendly technologies and behaviors.
Key among the SDGs, the way we see it is SDG 17, which relates to partnerships across international relations for sustainable development.
Our university has always been a promoter of scientific diplomacy, which shouldn't be affected by political Realities, scientific knowledge is a common good which should be available to all stakeholders.
Within this framework, we've run joint projects such as a joint university in Egypt, joint campus in China, a subsidiary in the Republic of Uzbekistan, 14 offices in 13 countries.
Our flagship decision on the SDG various scientific projects, including the one drop project SDG six.
Our chemists developed a mobile facility for cleaning industrial discharge through photo catalysis, which removes over 90% of toxic compounds.
This is an example of the circular economy in action.
The iron hydroxide that's left over can be used in metallurgy.
SDG 11 sustainable cities.
We have a compact city which we've developed using underground space to bolster energy efficiency and protect infrastructure from climate change.
In particular, we focus on SDG 13, climate change.
We have a St.
Petersburg adaptation plan, which is now a model for large coastal cities.
We're also working very successfully.
The speaker's microphone has been cut off.
Thank you for that.
I'm now going to give the floor to Indonesia and it's going to be followed by stakeholder 12, just so you know.
Okay.
Go ahead.
Okay.
Thank you very much, Moderator, Excellencies, allow me to begin by thanking all the briefers for their amazing insight.
Indonesia would further highlight several points.
First, Indonesia view SDI as a transformative enabler that is crucial in the attainment of SDG 2030.
Therefore, as part of our efforts to safeguard the future of STI, Indonesia integrates SDI skills development into our education curriculum, and training program.
Last year, our specialized national AI training program trained 1.2 million people from diverse backgrounds, ranging from young students to MSMEs sector.
However, access to digital infrastructure and gaps in human resources remain major challenges for Indonesia and addressing these challenges requires sustained investment in both digital infrastructure and human capital development.
Therefore, Indonesia always emphasizes the importance of strengthening international and multi stakeholder cooperation to ensure we could cope with the AI driven transformation.
Now, allow me to pose a question for Professor Wang Jian, but it's also open for other panelists on the evolution of the concept of open source to open resources.
What are their differences actually, and what are the open resource actually impacting? Does it also impact the supporting en fitment? Thank you very much.
Thank you for that.
Go ahead, Wang Zan.
Just a quick station why I come with the idea of open resource.
So think about in the software era, and when to of the open source, we basically, you know, give up the way for the source code.
So basically what's behind the source code is the manpower and IP the IP.
And so in that sense, it's very limited nature resource behind that, like electricity or whatever, you know, the computing power.
But with AI it's different.
AI is much more than software, that's for sure.
And what's really behind AI is the data resource, data.
And even though data on the Internet is open data, but it takes tremendous effort to organize the data.
So there's the data behind that.
And also, you know, like some people mentioned, the electric GPO of the computing power is a very, you know, precious resource, and it costs a lot of money.
And eventually what's behind the computing power is the electricity.
Okay.
So when we're talking about open model, that basically means there's a tremendous amount of resource behind that.
So when we open the model, we basically open the resource to the public, okay? And it costs more money, and there's a lot of more security issues than the open source code.
And we need a different license agreement to do that.
Okay.
I just want to emphasize tremendous effort behind the open model.
That's it.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for that.
I'm going to now come to the Blockchain Alliance International, followed by Holy Sea and Malta.
Thank you, sir.
Recent advances in artificial intelligence, particularly the emergence of AI agent systems and community driven data ecosystems or reshaping how organizations operate, make decisions, and deliver services.
So early AI agent applications demonstrate significant improvements in productivity, cost efficiency, and scalability and AI power tools enable smaller teams to achieve outcomes previously achievable only with far greater resources.
Um, at the same time, data has become a foundational resource in the AI.
However, access to high quality, diverse and trustworthy data remains a major challenge.
Emerging community driven data platforms enabled by blockchain technologies allow global community to contribute to data to AI development, expanding data availability while creating millions of micro work opportunities across the global source.
So in the meantime, these transformations also raise critical policy questions related to governance, workforce transitions, equitable access, and privacy.
Addressing these challenges require coordinated multi stakeholder collaborations across government, academia, the private sector, and the United Nations.
So the promise of ten X productivity must be anchored in performed responsibility.
As we integrate AI as a collaborative teammate, we must ensure that the technology enhances rather than diminishs human agency and dignity.
I thank you.
I thank you for that, and I'm going to hand that.
It's a good segue to hand it over to the Holy See.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
The progress being achieved in science, technology and innovation in fields such as medicine, engineering, and communication is extraordinary.
At the same time, it's necessary to ensure that innovations are used wisely and that risks and complexities are not overlooked.
Therefore, the challenge is not only technological, but also anthropological.
To shape science, technology and innovation for sustainable development, greater cooperation is required to address people's needs while respecting human dignity and promoting the common good.
Regarding artificial intelligence, insofar as AI can assist humans in making decisions, the algorithms that govern it should be trustworthy, secure, robust enough to handle inconsistencies, and transparent in their operation to mitigate biases and unintended side effects.
The ongoing preparatory process of the first global dialogue on AI governance is a key opportunity to emphasize the importance of AI's implications, including those in the ethical domain.
Allow me to conclude with the word of Pope Leo X, who stressed that it's important to educate ourselves and others about how to use AI intentionally, just as the Industrial Revolution called for basic literacy to enable people to respond to a new development, so too does the digital revolution require digital literacy, along with humanistic and cultural education.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
I'm going to come now to Malta and then followed by stakeholder 13.
Thank you, Chair.
Malta recognizes that science, technology and innovation are central to strengthening resilience, enhancing foresight, and navigating uncertainty.
Malt's National Research and Innovation Strategic Plan mainstreams research and innovation within public policy and embeds horizon scanning and intelligence briefings as core governance functions.
Anticipatory governance frameworks are indispensable as systemic shocks and accelerating technological change continue to outpace traditional policy responses.
Malta has invested in a digital innovation hub and has taken a broader strategic focus on emerging technologies which have enabled economic and societal progress.
Our AI strategy launched in 2019, positioned AI as a tool for anticipatory governance and piroted projects in public services such as health, education, and traffic management.
Following implementation and consultation, the strategy now prioritizes well being centered approaches with strengthened governance structures.
These investments exemplify SDG nine in practice, demonstrating the role of technology as an enabler for progress on all of the SDGs.
However, strengthening trust in emerging technologies requires not just a strong interface between technology and policy, but also collective action on the global scale.
Our 2024 digital diplomacy strategy and cooperation with European partners reflect our commitment to meaningful multilateral engagement.
Excellencies, Multi reaffirms its commitment to multilateral cooperation in SCI.
Shared foresight and best practices are essential to harnessing science, technology and innovation for resilience, equity, and sustainable development.
Thank you.
Thank you, and now to Internet Society Peru chapter.
Good.
I am Mariana, speaking on behalf of Io Peru, I'm a founder of Evolving HAP an organization that inpls stress maker across Latin America through education, mentorship, and community driving innovation.
In times of uncertainty, that question is not only how fast we innovate, but who gets to be part of that innovation.
Peru, we have learned that development only becomes sustainable when it's co owned by the people is mean to serve.
Through programs like Gs in ICT, connecting talents, creating futures, and TI build secure, a responsible AI or cybersecurity development program, we have seen young people, women, and rural populations see themselves not the user of technology, but as its future builders.
However, ownership requires commitment, and there are three areas we must add.
We should fund grassroot pipelines, solutions co designed with rural and indigenous population outperform top down interventions.
They last longer.
We need to bring as all stakeholder say AI governance frameworks to the local level because this diagonal speaking shape right now will define who benefits from AI and who bears its risk.
And we can formalize youth co governance.
People, especially in low connectivity areas must be active shapers of a secure and inclusive digital future.
We call all the members here to embed co governance in AI policy frameworks and to fund long term locally rooted pipelines.
The future will be shaped by people already addressing the most pressing challenges in the regions.
We only need to give them the spaces, the opportunities, and the diagonals they deserve because how we shape technology today determinates whose future we are actually building.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
The next three will be ITU, Australia, and Interpol, and I will now give it over to our friends at ITU.
Thank you, Mr.
Chair.
Excess delegates.
We are meeting in an era of rapid change, but at ITU, we believe that while the speed of innovation is determined by technology, each direction must be steered by international cooperation.
To navigate the systematic risks, we must move from high level foresight to practical global roadmaps.
The ITU addresses these through various activities that turn STI insights into SDG action.
First, the A for good platform.
In terms of uncertainty, we cannot afford fragmented efforts.
Air for good serves as the primary digital commons, which is a multi stakeholder space, where 50 plus UN agencies, private sector academia and civil society align their progress with SDGs.
It is where we turn speed versa safetions into collaborative urathons.
Second, the power standards.
To protect credibility and safety science, we need more than just policy.
We need technical frameworks.
Our standards work in various study groups ensures that infrastructure of the future is resilient by design.
Standards are the bridge between roboty prototype and a global public good.
They create the trust required for evidence based policy making.
Finally, the Air for Good skills Coalition.
We cannot achieve equity if the digital divide becomes a skills divide.
Our coalition has already empowered more than 20,000 learners across 80 countries.
By democratizing atras, we ensure that innovation doesn't just happen to the global South, but it is led by it.
As we look towards 23.
Our priority is clear.
We must move from air enabled to air native by embedding ethics, inclusion, and sustainability in the very architecture of our digital world.
ITU remains committed to ensure that science, technology, and innovation are not just tools for responding to change, but thank you very much heading now to Australia.
Thank you, moderator.
I don't have a question, but let me just thank all of our panelists today for their insights.
Australia welcomes this discussion on how science, technology and innovation can accelerate action on sustainable development and the 2030 agenda and help decision makers anticipate and respond to risk in an era of accelerating change.
On our part, last September, Australia released our first national climate risk assessment alongside a national adaptation plan.
The assessment shows climate impacts will cascade, compound, and occur concurrently, and that this will intensify.
The message is unambiguous.
Everybody and everything will be affected.
Our national adaptation plan demonstrates how SI can support anticipatory action translating science into policy, planning, governance, and resilience building across systems.
The same approach is needed globally to navigate trade offs, close critical knowledge gaps, and steer innovation towards sustainable development outcomes.
For Australia harnessing SI to progress, sustainable development requires protecting the people, institutions, and systems that make that progress possible.
This includes, for example, ensuring humanitarian personnel can operate safely, particularly as conflict environments become more urban, data dense and digitally mediated.
The risk managed use of early warning systems, crisis mapping, remote sensing and secure communications is essential to ensuring these technologies improve situational awareness and enable anticipatory action without being misuser or inadequately secured.
We were proud to co sponsor an official side event yesterday on sea level rise, water security and livelihoods in the Pacific with the International Science Council, and it's nice to see Professor digraph again.
For our Pacific neighbors, acting on science is not optional.
Sea level rise is the single greatest threat.
Australia supports Pacific Science capacity through the Pacific Academy of Sciences and Australia's Bureau of Meteorology operates sea level rise monitoring stations across the Pacific, providing foundational data for coastal planning.
Thank you.
That was right on time.
I just noticed, by the way, the blinking countdown clock that's behind us on the monitors, no pressure at all, but we really mean business.
I'm going to go now to Interpol, followed by Stakeholder 14.
Mr.
Chair, Excellency's, distinguished delegates.
Technologies once confined to science fiction have become real, and they are reshaping the field of transnational crime.
Criminals now use digitally encrypted messages to hide illegal assets.
Malicious drones transport drugs and deliver bombs and artificial intelligence is boosting cybercrime and fraud.
In this era of mass uncertainty, the best strategy is preparedness.
We need to forecast the risks posed by emerging technologies and steer innovation to boost sustainable development.
Interpol's Innovation Center is at the heart of this response, a knowledge hub for global law enforcement.
It brings together experts across policing, academia, and the private sector to harness technology to strengthen global security.
It helps countries respond to technological threats, for instance, by providing the only independent global platform to practice tracking, detecting, and neutralizing malicious drones.
It also trains law enforcement to utilize innovative tools such as AI powered digital forensics to strengthen investigations.
Finally, our center is constantly researching how the technologies of tomorrow may impact global security from quantum sensors to neuro technology.
Mr.
Chair, through strong international cooperation, we can ensure that technology works with us rather than against us in making the world a safer place.
I thank you.
Yeah, go ahead.
We can applaud if we like what we hear.
Yee Collins Research Group, and then I will be coming to Zimbabwe.
Thank you for the floor, Excellency's distinguished delegates and fellow researchers.
I'm taking the floor on behalf of E Collins Research Group and the Youth Publications and Social Economic Forum.
Our message today is simple, machine learning for scientific discovery can help advance the SDGs, but only a power To use and shape these tools to share more widely across countries, institutions, and generations.
I say this from personal experience.
I did not enter research with a traditional institutional pathway.
I entered because mentors were willing to take my question seriously and open the door to real scientific work, which led to me eventually being a research fellow at Stanford 2018.
That changed what I believe was possible for myself.
It also taught me something larger.
Talent is everywhere, but opportunity is not.
We have seen what young researchers can contribute when they are trusted with serious problems.
Our lab has produced research across machine learning for scientific discovery, including work presented in top computer science conferences globally.
These experiences show that youth participation is a real source of global scientific capacity.
Machine learning can accelerate discovery in areas central to SDGs, whether it's climate preservation or predicting weather events.
But if these tools are developed only by a narrow group of people in a narrow group of places, the benefits will also be narrow.
If we want science to serve humanity, then the future of science must be shaped by more of humanity, especially the younger generation.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Heading now to Zimbabwe, followed by IAEA.
Thank you, moderator.
Barbara welcomes the convening of this session, and we want to reaffirm our commitment to harnessing STI as a driver of structural transformation while navigating the uncertainties of rapid technological advancement.
In our economic blueprint, the National Development Strategy tool, STI is identified as one of the ten national priorities, and it is envisaged as a key driver of the broader development agenda, including our vision of attaining middle income status by 2030.
But we recognize that the attainment of this vision will depend also on a global system that supports the advancement of STI as a driver of sustainable development.
We want to highlight three other issues on technological transfer.
We believe that it's important that we move towards concrete mechanisms for technology transfer, including access to patents, open source platforms, and structured technical cooperation.
So that developing countries are not left behind.
On capacity building, we want to move from exporting raw materials to building productive competitive capacity anchored innovation, and we also want to be developers of contract driven solution.
We believe that this requires sustained investment in local research institutions, universities, and innovation ecosystems as outlined in the compromise of the SVA, STI roadmaps must include dedicated, adequately funded capacity building pillars.
And also, we want to reinforce the code for an AI governing structure that is developed in an inclusive manner and that it becomes not only a domain of a few so that we reduce the digital divide.
We also want to join the code that a global AI governing structure be finalized for 2030 and beyond.
And we also want to ask the question that what specific measurable actions can be taken to transmit commitments in the pact and in the compromis into touchable results? Thank you very much.
Go ahead.
It's okay.
That's so hard to say, but I know what it is.
It's the International Atomic Energy Agency and then we'll go to stakeholder 15, followed by Cambodia.
Thank you, moderator, Excellency, colleagues.
The IAEA Scientific Laboratory in Vienna and in Monaco, plus over 90 collaborating institutions in the member states are designed to harness scientific achievement and channel them toward practical sustainable solution.
In the energy sector, the IA support member states transition toward low carbon emission.
With our partnership with the World Bank and other international financial institutions, we support member states to develop nuclear power.
In agriculture and food, IEA work with IAO to provide a nuclear solution by atom for food Initiative.
In the water resources management, nuclear science offer tools of remarkable precision to MP and sustainable management groundwater service to operate wastewater treatment.
These technology are already bolstering sustainable access to clean water in over 100 countries around the world.
Artificial technology are transforming every field.
IAA is actively exploring AI technology to enhance nuclear safety, improve cancer diagnostic and treatment, and optimize agriculture and water management practice.
Shaping the future of ITI demands sustained collective investment in science and technology.
IE laboratories, network, and the technical cooperation program are at the disposal of all member states.
I thank you.
Thank you very much.
Heading now to Stakeholder 15, Children and Youth International.
I see you right there.
Hi.
Hello.
Good afternoon, Excellencies.
I'm Maria Trez Phaira, a PhD candidate at Cornell University in robotics and AI, and I speak on behalf of the major group of children and youth as a technology focal point for the youth science policy interface platform.
Young people, and I echo my neighbor here, are not just beneficiaries of science and technology, we're co creators, innovators, and yet we remain systematically excluded from deciding governance mechanisms and under represented at the tables where these decisions are taking place.
We call on this forum to act on four urgent priorities.
First, we must stop treating deployment as the beginning of accountability.
Before any technology is scaled, we must ask who is excluded from the data, who was never imagined as a user, and what are the energy and water costs? Not as footnotes, but as deciding factors.
These burdens fall hardest on communities already on the front lines of climate breakdown.
We need mandatory, independent intersectional pre deployment impact assessments, not voluntary disclosures drafted by the company seeking approval.
Second, AI governance must reflect the world it claims to serve.
The people designing AI systems are drawn from a vanishingly narrow slice of identities, and when marginalized intersectional identities, youth, women are absent from these rooms, their needs are not just underrepresented, they are encoded out of technology.
Third, young people need funded pathways into science and research ecosystems.
Higher education and scientific institutions are the pillars of SED implementation and at a moment of rising misinformation and declining trust in science, we cannot afford to fund them.
That's time for me.
Well, thank you.
I mean, you raised a lot of great points there.
Faith in youth is important and we're down to our final three.
I'm going to go now to Cambodia.
To moderate the global landscape is marked by increased uncertainty driven by newly emerging risks ranging from public health emergencies and climate shocks to trade frictions and geopolitical tensions, and economic crisis that raises the cost of living, impedes the advancement of healthcare, education, and other development targets.
In retrospect, many countries can be included positions SDI based solutions at the forefront of the fight against the COVID 19 pandemic to manage critical supplies and trade shipments and develop digital platforms for social distancing and social protection.
Businesses also accelerate the adoption of technology to survive lockdowns and disrupted supply chains and for internal operations.
Being among countries highly impacted by the recurrence of severe floods and droughts our nationwide early warning systems EWS 1294 developed through partnerships with people in need of the Czech Republic, provides timely floods and climate hazards alerts through mobile voice and text messages and instead messaging apps.
Cambria also becomes a member of the group on Earth observation to advance our knowledge and understanding of Geospn systems, institute digital monitoring tools and satellite Earth observation to inform mitigation measures for the packs of climate change and essentially to support the implementation of the 2030 agenda.
These examples serve as a reminders that there is an increasing need to harness SDI for sustainable development in times of uncertainty and change, whether to mitigate the negative impacts of global health and planetary crisis or serving as an effective means to bridge differences or foster international relations through science diplomacy.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Final two, Stakeholder 16, International Association of University Professors and lecturers, followed by stakeholder 11.
Excellency distinguished colleagues.
Our association welcomes the quantum physics year, proclaimed by the United Nations and we welcome Quantum Safe by design, which is linked to the ethics of artificial intelligence.
This is linked to secure sovereign systems right from the design stage.
We've seen that the most remarkable advances such as quantum computers were created by a third generation of post Einstein scientists who often studied at Sorbonpar Tp or other universities that are part of a technology hub.
Despite these scientific and technological advances, there are not enough discussions of quantum technology governance.
Although there have been discussions in EcoSc for this reason, we, our association calls on member states to focus their debates on these topics as part of the global digital compact.
Today, we need to lock in investment in hybrid infrastructure, AI, and quantum infrastructure so that they can be harnessed to serve SDGs, in particular, the way in which water and other resources are used.
I thank you for your kind attention.
Thank you very much.
Finally, I see you there, Stakeholder 11, CO Earth Corporation.
Take it away.
Thank you, moderator, Excellencies, distinguished delegates.
I'm doctor Chetan ahi Emmett, CEO of CO Earth.
I would like to address how STI systems can better support global public goods by closing persistent knowledge gaps.
While science, technology and innovation advance, a deeper gap remains what we prioritize.
Many environmental pressures are overlooked, not for lack of data, but for perception.
CLO Earth highlights these overlooked environmental pressures within interconnected Earth's systems.
These are indicators of human influence on planetary processes.
Adré them requires focusing on three Ps, a perception gap in priorities, a practice gap in applying knowledge, and a participation gap in shaping solutions.
If an issue is not perceived, it's ignored.
If practice does not evolve, solutions fail.
If participation is limited, solutions remain incomplete.
Strengthening STI system, therefore requires three shifts.
First, broadening knowledge of under recognized environmental risks.
Second, integrating human behavior into innovation.
So solutions are adopted, not only developed.
Third, strengthening participation through youth and community engagement.
Seal Earth introduces planetary serenity as a complementary lens, linking innovation with ecological harmony and long term collective responsibility.
Closing knowledge gap requires not only advancing science, but broadening what matters for a more serene relationship with Earth's systems.
Thank you.
Thank you.
While we packed a lot into just 2.5 hours.
It's like diplomatic speed dating, but it was really great to hear from so many diverse opinions and if there are any common threads that I think we all picked up on, it's clear that the future of science and technology is not just about innovation, it's about governance.
It's about greater inclusion and ensuring that science remains trusted, open, and collaborative.
If we get that right, STI can be one of our most powerful tools to deliver the SDGs.
I want to thank everybody who was up here with us, our panelists, all the people from the crowd.
Thank you.
Give them around the applause.
All of the respondents and participants.
With that, I will hand the floor over to our session co chair who has been so patiently waiting and listening to all this great information, Ambassador Gregor Kosler of Austria.
Totally.
Thank you.
We have reached the end of session three, but bear with me.
You have already solicited some applause, but I will do so again.
Give me another second.
I want to thank first our moderator, Tony Massieu for his really great and witty spirit.
Um, guiding the discussion.
All our speakers and participants.
I have to make a particular shout out to the two co chairs of the first global dialogue on artificial intelligence governance and thank you, Agri for staying with us till the end.
This is really significant because very often we talk about silos, but actually we do try to link processes together, and so this is the sign of it.
Very important.
Now you may give an applause again to the moderator and all the other great participants.
Okay.
What we've heard today highlights both the opportunities and challenges facing SDI systems in a rapidly changing world.
Emerging technologies do offer powerful tools, but they also require careful governance and stronger cooperation.
And I think we have heard good news.
Like you gave us, that there are publication rates are going up, for example, in low middle income countries, and this is a systematic positive trend.
And we have discussed a lot about international collaboration, but I think the most fundamental one was really on protecting science as an open system, seeing science as a public good, um, without being naive about the geopolitical aspects of what that means and how we navigate this uncertainty.
This is something we can take away from this forum.
Um.
Also, I think we've learned a lot about this concept of the open resource model.
This is also, I think, a very, very valuable intellectual addition.
So let's continue in this spirit.
I'm I pausing now this meeting to rearrange the podium.
We will be rejoined, I think, by the president of EcoSc.
But please stay seated.
We will proceed immediately after the rearrangement and close the session for good.
Thank you.
How are you? Yes.
Yes.
Excellencies, distinguished delegates.
We have come to the conclusion of the 11th multi stakeholder forum on science, technology, and innovations for the Sustainable Development Goals.
I would like to thank the forum co Sirs.
His Excellency, Gregor Khosla Perman representative of Austria, and His Excellency, Mr.
La Milambo, Perman Representative of Gambia, and for skillfully co chairing the discussions over the past two days.
I now invite His Excellency, Gregor Khosla, Perman representative of Austria to deliver his closing remarks.
Excellency, you have the floor.
Thank you, President.
Thank you, D Lock.
Pleasure to have you here at the closing.
Bear with me.
I have five pages.
I can't do it in 2 minutes, but I think there is some good substance.
It is a privilege to bring to a close this 11th session of the ICI forum.
I think over the past two days, we've reaffirmed the central role of STI in advancing the SDGs.
We do know that we're living in a time of increased geopolitical tensions and widening inequalities, accelerating climate impacts, and rapid technological change.
But at the same time, the forum reminded us that progress in science and innovation remain essential for building resilience, inclusion, and sustainable prosperity.
Participants also emphasized that sustainable transitions involve managing trade offs across sectors and communities, requiring integrated and evidence based policy making.
I did it on purpose.
Throughout our discussion, one message emerged clearly technology alone is not enough.
Innovation must be accompanied by inclusive governance, intelligence, and equitable financing, strong institutions, and international cooperation.
Whether discussing AI, water systems, energy transitions or scientific cooperation, Participants consistently emphasized that the benefits of SDI must reach all countries and communities, especially those currently left furthest behind.
Then digital and innovation divides, and we've also learned data divides continue to constrain progress for many developing countries.
The opening ministerial discussions reminded us that the world remains significantly off track with achieving the SDGs yet.
We've also talked about opportunities created by rapid advances in science and technologies.
Our keynote speakers, Professor Rita Ori, reminded us that the central question surrounding AI is not only how powerful it is, but who it is designed for.
I think something you just took up also from the innovator, stakeholder side.
It's also about who designs it and who it is designed for so that it's not just serving certain communities.
Her intervention highlighted the risks of technological systems being developed without sufficient attention to local realities, infrastructure constraints, and unequal access.
The message was clear, developing countries must not only adopt technology, but must participate in shaping innovation pathways and governance frameworks.
Professor Helmut Hasak from Austria, the second keynote sper reminded us of the growing fragility of global water systems and the importance of scientific cooperation in addressing climate related risks.
His remarks reinforced that water security underpins nearly every dimension of sustainable development, and that stronger international cooperation, scientific observation, evidence based governance are increasingly essential.
Our first thematic session focused on transforming water systems with STI, and they highlighted both the scale of the global water crisis and the opportunities.
So there's enormous pressure by climate change, pollution, over extraction and many other factors, placing immense pressure, especially on the freshwater systems worldwide, which compose only a very small fraction of water.
So speakers emphasized the importance of looking at the entire water cycle, including groundwater, atmospheric moisture flows, ecosystems, land use, and urban systems, rather than just addressing individual water challenges in isolation.
We were, in all the sessions, especially inspired by young innovators who presented locally grounded solutions from Africa and South America, demonstrating the importance of supporting local innovation ecosystems that respond directly to community needs.
Our second thematic session, we're making progress, focused on powering sustainable development through clean energy technologies.
Participants highlighted that despite rapid advances in renewable energy systems, hundreds of millions of people still lack access to the very basic, basic electricity and clean cooking solutions.
So the discussions demonstrated the decentralized renewable energy systems, mini grid storage technologies and digital energy platforms, and smarter urban infrastructure systems are increasingly viable.
So there is also good news.
At the same time, it was emphasized that scaling clean energy requires more than deploying or developing infrastructure.
It requires investment in local capacities and also long term investments looking ahead.
Integrated planning, for example, across energy industry, food, water, transport, and urban systems.
Discussions also highlighted the growing role of remote sensing, earth observation, and data driven planning tools in supporting more resilience.
The forum also examined the growing relationship between digitalization and energy demand, particularly in the context of AI, data infrastructure, and computing systems.
This is, again, incredibly important because if that technology consumes so much energy, you can imagine where it will be, where it will be most viable and where there are lacks and the gaps.
Several speakers also highlighted the importance of sustainable construction materials.
We learned that, for example, cement, which is still very, very fundamental, of course, also has a high carbon impact, and planning needs to address those issues for long term up to the end of this century, especially in Africa.
And while others stress the importance of blended finance, risk reduction mechanisms and stronger multilateral support to mobilize investment at scale.
Our final thematic session, and we're almost there, examined the future of STI in times of uncertainty and change.
The global landscape, as we all know, for science and innovation is evolving rapidly, but it's also shaped by geopolitical tensions, accelerating technological change and growing pressures on multilateral cooperation.
At the same time, we also know that international scientific collaboration remains indispensable for addressing shared global challenges including climate change or the governance or the potential governance of emerging technologies.
AI featured prominently throughout the discussions.
Participants recognized its transformative potential across sectors, ranging from health and agriculture to energy systems and scientific research while emphasizing the need for governance frameworks that are inclusive, trustworthy, human centered, aligned with sustainable development.
Again, we discussed a lot in this context about the digital gap and also the data gap.
The session repeatedly underscored the importance of protecting scientific integrity, strengthening trust in science, investing in local research and innovation e ecosystems, and also, which is very important, the openness of science balanced with no naivete.
I thank you and I now hand over to my co chair, Cholo Milambo.
Thank you very much, Ambassador McGregor.
He has covered quite a lot of ground, so he left not much for me.
But anyway, I'll capture some of the common themes that emerged, but before that, just some observations.
Thank you very much, Mr.
President, I must say, and thank you very much, SSG.
And also recognize we don't really talk about the Secretariat, but they really worked very hard, thank you very much.
The discussions in this forum also highlight the rapidly evolving global landscape for SI, a landscape shaped simultaneously by extraordinary scientific advances and growing geopolitical and institutional uncertainty.
Participants noted the rapid growth of scientific capacity in low and middle income countries, while also stressing that significant disparities remain in research financing, infrastructure, scientific mobility, and access to global knowledge networks.
Many speakers emphasized that international scientific cooperation must remain essential for addressing shared global challenges, including climate change, biodiversity loss, pandemics, and technological governance.
AI was a major focus throughout the session.
Participants recognize artificial intelligence, transformative potential across sectors including health, agriculture, climate adaptation, energy systems, and scientific research.
At the same time, many warn that AI governance frameworks must address inequality, exclusion, concentration of power, misinformation, and even access to data and digital infrastructure.
The discussions repeatedly emphasized that AI governance must remain human centered, inclusive, and grounded in sustainable development principles.
In this space, we also welcome the very important contributions from the co chairs of the dialogue, the global Dialogue on Air governance, and we look forward to continuing these discussions during the next STI forum.
Across all these sessions, several common themes emerged.
First, inclusion remains central.
Digital divides, scientific divides, and innovation divides continue to limit opportunities for many countries and communities, particularly women, girls and young people, as well as LDCs and small island development states.
Second, governance matters.
Institutions, financing systems, regulatory frameworks, and public trust will determine whether STI contributes to sustainable development outcomes.
Third, local capacity building is indispensable.
Sustainable STI systems require investment in education, research institutions, digital infrastructure, and local innovation systems.
Fourth, systems thinking is increasingly necessary.
Water, energy, food systems, urban systems, digital infrastructure are deeply interconnected and require an integrated approach.
Fith, multilateral cooperation remains essential.
The global challenges we face cannot be addressed by any one country alone.
Colleagues, the forum also demonstrated the continuing importance of the technology facilitation mechanism as the one UN multi stakeholder platform for dialogue, knowledge sharing, and partnership building.
We'd like to express our sincere gratitude to the ten member group of high level representatives, the interagency Task Force TTT, including ACAT and the Executive Office of the Secretary-General.
Above all, we would like to thank DES team, as Secretariat of the forum for its outstanding dedication and support.
We also express our gratitude to all member states, scientists, innovators, civil society representatives, youth participants, and stakeholders whose contributions enrich this forum.
Excellencies, as we move forward towards the high level political forum and continue preparations for the 2026 Water Conference in December and broader discussions on digital cooperation and artificial intelligence governance.
The messages emerging from this forum should guide our collective effort.
We must strengthen international scientific cooperation.
We must invest in inclusive innovation ecosystems.
We must ensure that emerging technologies support human dignity, sustainability and resilience, and we must continue building bridges across sectors, disciplines, and regions.
The future of science, technology and innovation will shape the future of sustainable development.
Our shared responsibility is to ensure that this transformation benefits all people and all countries.
I thank you and I will see you in the next chapter of our work.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
I thank Ambassador Khosla and Ambassador Milambo for their closing remarks, also summarizing the discussions in the past two days.
Now let me deliver my closing remarks as the president of the Ecoac, distinguished co chairs of the SDI forum, Assistant Secretary-General, Excellencies, distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen.
Over the past two days, we have witnessed something remarkable.
A global community determined not simply to talk about science, technology, and innovations, but to harness it, harness it or gently, equitively and at scale.
We gather with just five years left until 2030.
The old is not it on track, but this forum has shown that STI is not a distinct promise.
But it is a present lifeline.
From AI governance to closing the digital divide and grassroots innovations from low resource settings, you have demonstrated that solutions exist.
The question is no longer if innovation can solve the S disease.
But how we close the divides that too many behind.
You have turned the commitments of the of the future and the global digital compact into practical STI cooperation.
You have shown how the technology facilities and mechanisms delivers through inter agency testing assessment of low emissions technology diffusion, through the expansion of STI for the SDGs roadmaps, and through over 900 submission to this year's calls for innovations, many from Young SANE makers.
The Saba commitment and Doha Political declarations have given us renewed policy momentum.
Now, we must carry that momentum forward into national budgets, into financing for development, into enabling policies that make innovations accessible, affordable, and adaptable to local realities.
Let me be very clear.
The SI forum is not a closing ceremony.
It is a law spat.
Your ideas, your partnerships, and except plans and roadmaps will directly inform the High level Political Forum in July this year.
They will see how we tackle SDG six, seven, nine, and 17 on water, on energy, on industry, cities, and partnerships.
Once again, I thank our distinguished co chairs, the ten member group, the UN interagency task team led by DSA and Anktat and all who contributed to 65 side events and then joint special meeting on digital inclusion and youth entrepreneurship.
Above all, I thank you, all the scientists, innovators, policymakers, entrepreneurs, civil society, and young people for bringing hope, for bringing your ingenuity and accents.
Let us leave this room.
Resolve to breeze every digital innovations and capacity divide.
Let us ensure that no one, no community, no country, no young persons, girls and women is left behind.
The 2030 agenda is still within reach.
Together, let us make the next five years count.
I thank you.
Excellencies, these delegates.
With that, I hereby declare close the 11th multi stakeholder forum on STI for Sustainable Development.