Bold innovation roadmap outlines the Kingdom’s tech progress – Khmer Times
Cambodia is undertaking a bold five-pronged approach to foster digitalisation in its aim to reach upper-middle-income country status by 2030 and high-income designation by 2050, the government’s Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) Roadmap 2030 reveals.
“The Covid-19 pandemic has precipitated an overwhelming health crisis and hampered socio-economic development,” Prime Minister Hun Sen wrote in the document’s foreword.
“Despite impressive economic growth rates in the past decade, the economy of Cambodia has seen a contraction in growth since 2020 due to the disruption of local and global supply chains.”
Directors-General from 18 different ministries, rectors of eight leading higher education and research centres, eight chief executive officers and representatives of a collective six accelerator centres and international development partners consulted in the drafting of the roadmap.
Its five “pillars” include growing the number of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) university students by at least 50 percent by 2030.
The pillars recognise the Ministry of Industry, Science, Technology and Innovation as an agency overseeing policies and their implementation, investing 1 percent of national gross domestic product (GDP) to research, strengthening collaboration and networking among key stakeholders, fostering an ecosystem for innovation plus attracting STI-related firms to the country.
“As Cambodia aims to develop an industrial-based economy and to become an upper-middle income country by 2030, having qualified human resources in STEM-related fields will be critical to attract FDI [foreign direct investment], the document read.
The government aims to have women make up at least 50 percent of all STEM graduates and to develop curricula for master’s and doctorates in collaboration with the private sector by 2024.
Industry, Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Cham Prasidh described the STI roadmap as a “game changing decision” that will allow Cambodia to “enter a new era of revitalsed civilisation”.
According to the document, the STI policies will focus on five domains including agricultural yield, modern production and engineering, health and biomedical, material science and engineering services plus a digital economy including artificial intelligence and space technology.
The public and private sectors are anticipated to contribute 0.5 percent of national GDP to public investments under the STI.
Funds will be used to build platforms, such as laboratories with robots, sensors and imagery technology at universities for education by 2023 – benefiting 500 students.
Richard Yim, who sits on the advisory board for the National Council for Science, Technology and Innovation, told Khmer Times that he viewed the roadmap as a step in the right direction and described it as being “very progressive”.
Yim is also the founder of Quantum Engineering and Manufacturing and was listed on Forbes’ “30 Under 30”.
He stressed that the inclusion of incubator hubs would allow entrepreneurs to scale up and foster a pioneering and inclusive environment.
“We have been talking about corporations wanting STEM graduates but there is not enough supply to meet demand in relation to the war for talent. If the goals are reached, there will be more jobs for people with higher pay and [it will] push a lot of students to study STEM subjects,” Yim said.
“Including women in the STEM education roadmap is extremely progressive and I am hopeful that this is happening early enough in Cambodia that it will not end up being a male-dominated industry. Personally, I cannot wait for it to happen because it has the potential to suddenly make Cambodia a leader regionally in STEM,” he continued.