Date: August 18, 2016
EMBARGOED: NOT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE BEFORE 10:00 AM, AUGUST 18
World’s Academies Launch New Project on Scientific Input to Global Policymaking
NEW YORK - The InterAcademy Partnership 1 – the global network of national science, medical andengineering academies – today launched a new three-year project on scientific advice for global
policymaking. Conducted in partnership with the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) 2 and sponsored byCarnegie Corporation of New York 3, the project will explore how to strengthen scientific input to theUnited Nations, governments, and other stakeholders aimed at achieving the UN’s Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs). Officially known as Transforming Our World: the 2030 Agenda for
Sustainable Development, the SDGs are 169 aspirational targets for sustainable human development
covering issues such as ending poverty and hunger, ensuring healthy lives and quality education,
combating climate change, and protecting the global environment.
At its inaugural meeting in New York today, the project's committee of 11 scientists, with an impressive
collective experience of multilateral cooperation in science and science policy, discussed the current
landscape for global scientific advice and explored ways of strengthening the science-policy
interface. Several invited experts provided insights on the key challenges that scientists and scienceadvisers face in global systems.
Over the course of the project, the committee will explore the strengths, weaknesses and opportunities
for science advice; where national science academies and inter-academy networks can play their part;and what needs to change for better regional and national evidence-based implementation of the UN's
global policy frameworks.
“The UN’s 2030 Agenda is a well-articulated, globally adopted framework. It is high-impact, high-stakes,and provides an opportunity to examine the increasingly complex landscape of global science advice,”
said Professor Robbert Dijkgraaf, president of IAP and director and Leon Levy professor at IAS. “I
anticipate that this project will provide useful insight to the academies and the wider scientific andpolicymaking communities.”
Professor LI Jinghai, co-chair of the IAP project committee and vice-president of the Chinese Academy ofSciences, reiterated the importance of providing high-quality evidence-based advice to policymakers:“IAP and other international science networks – perhaps most prominently ICSU (the InternationalCouncil for Science) – can help ensure that science plays its part in attaining the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs). They can help shape policies and best practices for developing policy advice
as a foundation for improving practices worldwide.”

www.interacademies.org
www.ias.edu
3
www.carnegie.org
12

1

“This project can help foster dialogue and cooperation between providers of global scientific advice,”
added Dr. Eva Alisic, IAP project committee co-chair and past co-chair of the Global Young Academy,“including all disciplines, and all generations. Both established and early-career scholars are keen tomake science work for society.”
More about the IAP
The InterAcademy Partnership (IAP) is a new umbrella organization formed by the merging of threeestablished inter-academy networks: the InterAcademy Council, IAP—The Global Network of Science
Academies, and the InterAcademy Medical Panel. IAP currently has 130 member academies, which
together reach governments that represent 95 percent of the world’s population.
Media Contact:TBD
InterAcademy Partnership
Committee on Improving Scientific Input to Global Policymaking: Strategies for Attaining theSustainable Development Goals
Dr. Eva Alisic (co-chair)
Immediate past co-chair, Global Young Academy
Senior research fellow, Monash University, Australia
Visiting scholar, University Children's Hospital Zurich, Switzerland
Visiting scholar, University Medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands
Professor LI Jinghai (co-chair)Vice President
Chinese Academy of Sciences
China
Professor Michael Barber
Emeritus Professor
Australian Academy of Science
Australia
Professor Rajae El Aouad
Immunology
Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy of Rabat
MoroccoProfessor Peter Fritz
Scientific Director (retired)
Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research UFZ
Germany2Professor Sandra Harrison
Centre for Past Climate Change
Geography and Environmental Science
University of Reading
United Kingdom
Professor Norichika Kanie
Graduate School of Media and Governance
Keio UniversityJapan
Professor Keto Elitabu Mshigeni
Research Professor
Hubert Kairuki Memorial University
Tanzania
Professor Muhammad Saidam
Chief Science Officer of Applied Science
Royal Scientific Society of Jordan
JordanProfessor Francisco José Sánchez-Sesma
Graduate Earth Sciences
National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM)
MexicoProfessor Robert Scholes
Global Change and Sustainability Research Institute (GCRSI)
University of WitwatersrandSouth Africa###3