Business news

BESHENKOVICHY, 26 September (BelTA) – Belarus and Slovakia have outlined four priority areas to step up bilateral cooperation in science, Olga Nachtmannova, State Secretary of the Slovak Education, Science, Research and Sport Ministry, told the media on 26 September, BelTA has learned.

“We have many promising areas for cooperation. To make our cooperation as effective as possible we decided to focus on four main areas, namely, engineering, agriculture, development of new materials and, above all, medicine,” Olga Nachtmannova said.

The Belarus-Slovakia commission on cooperation in science and technology outlined these areas during the first session in Minsk on 25 September. The commission also established the projects deadlines. Belarus and Slovakia are planning to organize a contest of joint research projects in priority areas, including energy, information technologies, nanotechnologies, biotechnologies, medicine and pharmaceutics. The relevant decision will be made next summer and funding will start on 1 September 2019.

Olga Nachtmannova noted that she is fascinated by Belarus’ achievements in science and assured that closer cooperation will help the two countries reach great results.

Olga Nachtmannova got acquainted with the work of the NatiVita research and production complex in Beshenkovichy (Vitebsk Oblast). “I have not been to Vitebsk Oblast before. But I heard a lot about this enterprise, so I decided to visit it,” she added. The Slovak delegation is also scheduled to visit Vitebsk State Order of Peoples' Friendship Medical University (VSMU).

Belarus’ pharmaceutical company NatiVita together with the Biomedical Centre in the city of Martin (Slovakia), VSMU and the Alexandrov National Cancer Center (Belarus) is implementing the Belarus-Slovakia research projects to develop innovative high-tech methods of personalized diagnostics and treatment of cancer.