In this interview during the opening ceremony of IYBSSD, Dr. Luther Castillo Harry, Secretary of Science, Technology, and Scientific Innovation, Republic of Honduras, highlights the importance of investing in science, innovation and technology.
Honduras and IYBSSD
Here we generate in one way or another, an appropriation of the individual with sciences.
Honduras was the country that presented the proposal at the United Nations with the the countries that have also supported this process. And we are here at the opening of the International Year of Basic Sciences, which for us is of very big importance.
What role can basic science play in sustainable development?
Therefore, in the basic sciences, every day for us, they must provide solutions to people’s realities, which is what the Millennium Development Goals are all about. So, when we combine these purposes that every time the answers of science must generate and provide solutions to the problems of the people, we believe that this is an important point to combine the Millennium Development Goals.
The first thing that is a challenge for science, I believe that in our regions we need to feel the amalgamation with the popular feeling, which is of utmost importance, the traditional history of science has been very far from the people; even conceptually, it is also a challenge to bring these concepts closer to the people, because there is no science without people, nor people without science. It is an element that must be linked. So we believe that this is challenge number one. The second challenge is how science should respond to the needs of the people. That people are always understood as the subjects of science. So there we generate, in one way or another, an appropriation of the individual with science.
Are the fundamental sciences the only ones to play a role in the future?
The popular and ancestral knowledge of the peoples today must also be recognized by the scientific endeavor. Historically, there has been a divorce and an exclusion in the hierarchy of the scientific method and in these popular ancestral knowledges that the peoples have embraced for many years.
What is your biggest wishes for this year to come?
For us we are welcoming Honduras to be the Latin American host of the First UNESCO Meeting of Basic Sciences for Sustainable Development, which is going to be in Honduras, possibly in February. We welcome this. Our President has generated all her openness so that we can be the Latin American venue for this UNESCO event on Basic Sciences. So it is going to be a continental venue and I believe that today we are also preparing ourselves as a country to generate the proposal of the decade of basic sciences, which will be for us a very important point for our country to participate in the proposal of the decade of basic science within the framework of sustainable development.
