COMSTE.gov.ph - Message from the Executive Director

The Congressional Commission on Science & Technology and Engineering was created by Joint Resolution Number 1 of the 13th Congress. COMSTE has been assigned the task of taking a critical look at the state of our competitiveness in S&T. The first year, under the leadership of Undersecretary Fortunato Dela Peña of DOST, the Panels completed an in depth look into the competitiveness posture of the different Sectors - Energy and Environment, Food and Agriculture, Basic Science Math and Engineering Education, Semiconductors and Electronics, ICT/ICT-enabled services, and Health.

COMSTE is proposing the Philippines invest more in R&D, focus on improving our record of technology transfer to industry, make significant changes in our curriculum to promote research and innovation, and address innovation in fields that cross sector boundaries. The first year recommendations are now being fashioned into legislative initiatives, R&D institutional changes, collaborative projects involving Industry-Academe partnerships, and global S&T partnerships.

Now the Panels are formulating and proposing bold new S&T initiatives and strategies that will enhance the rate of technology transfer from academe to industry, create new opportunities for innovation in multi-disciplinary fields like biofuels, IT for Agriculture, telemedicine, and climate change driven disasters, and new institutions (like ITRI-Philippines) that will effectively drive innovation towards relevant near-term results. The S&T strategy that is emerging will help organize our R&D investments into a strategic portfolio of R&D initiatives. In this way we can leverage our investments (albeit meager on the world scale of R&D investment) through Industry-Investor inclusion early in the R&D process and through global partnership programs.

Globalization creates an opportunity for us to collaborate on S&T. This is a crucial step in leveraging the investments of other nations in basic and applied sciences into our national S&T strategy. S&T initiatives in ethanol production, electronics design and testing, solar power, effective herbal medicines, and satellite based resources management are best carried out by partnering with world leaders in these fields. In this way our own investments are leveraged with the investment of other countries and our researchers advance into doing state of the art science and engineering. It is important that we prioritize these collaborative S&T initiatives, so our investments in R&D are well leveraged.

The current global economic crisis is an opportunity for the Philippines S&T community in the academe and Industry to concentrate on creating new industries and high skilled jobs that create high value new products and services. Historically we do not have a good track record of technology transfer from the academe to industry and in times like these reform is necessary.

The COMSTE Panels are focusing on multi-disciplined S&T projects like telemedicine for improved barangay health and wellness centers and sustainable energy systems and ICT for agricultural clusters. These focused initiatives will create new business opportunities for entrepreneurs to utilize the latest R&D coming from our Universities. We are already beginning to see techno-entrepreneurs knocking on the lab doors of our best scientists and engineers in the academe, seeking partnerships with the Universities to create new products and new companies. COMSTE wants this new ecosystem of innovation flourish and lead to the creation of innovative products and services.

This is an exciting time for a nation like the Philippines that is blessed with highly innovative scientists and engineers. Competing in the modern world without a coherent S&T strategy would leave us at a major disadvantage. COMSTE, sitting at the nexus of public policy and S&T, seeks to help to create that innovation ecosystem in which our highly creative technologists can create future industries and create new job opportunities for Filipinos.