Wednesday, December 20 2023 16:14

ArmInfo. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and the President of the Republic Vahagn Khachatoryan participated in the ceremonial session dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the founding of the National Academy of Sciences, the PM's press service reports.

Members of the National Assembly, Cabinet members, delegations from the Academies of Sciences of Moldova, Greece, Austria, the Czech Republic, Russia, Belarus, Bulgaria, Iran, and the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (Dubna, RF) also took part in the jubilee session.  First, Ashot Saghyan, president of the National Academy of Sciences, delivered a report.

In his speech, Prime Minister Pashinyan particularly said, "Honorable President of the Republic of Armenia, Dear representatives of the legislative, executive branches, Dear academicians, doctors, Dear President of the National Academy of Sciences, I congratulate all of us on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia.  In this hall, we have had many occasions to talk about the glorious heritage of the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia, and I want to emphasize that we do not consider it as something to just point out, but as an important and strategic asset necessary to make a strategic investment in the future.

I apologize for introducing a little personal episode into this discussion, but I really enjoy spending my free time getting information about science news, achievements, watching movies, naturally, on reputable science channels, platforms. And every time I note with pleasant surprise and pride that today, many scientists working in Armenia have a very concrete contribution to the latest scientific achievements as part of international scientific teams.

And I have recorded for myself, but now for the first time I am talking about this topic out loud. I don't think we cover this enough.  Sometimes, I learn news that if I didn't watch those international YouTube channels, I'm not sure I would know about those achievements and the contribution of scientists working in Armenia to them. I think this is a very important issue.  Of course, I also want to emphasize and admit that we sometimes go from extreme to extreme in this matter. And we should not exaggerate while vovering this topic, either positively or negatively. When we overexaggerate the positive, many scientists feel underappreciated, thinking that our focus is not where it should be, but when we don't pay enough attention, it turns out that there are many scientists that our community needs to know to be familiar with the modern and breakthrough achievements our scientists are dealing with.

But this information has and had practical significance for me to record that despite all the difficulties that the President of the National Academy of Sciences spoke about, the scientific potential of our country is not exhausted at all. On the contrary, there is a lot of accumulated scientific potential, and it is really time, even with some delay, for the Armenian government to make serious investments in the field of science.

This factor also played a role in that we have been continuously increasing the funding of science in the Republic of Armenia since 2019.  In 2023, for example, compared to 2018, the funding of the science sector increased by 151 percent, about 2.5 times. In 2024, science funding will increase by 181 percent with the adopted budget.

In this context, I consider it very important to emphasize the program on the salary increase of science workers, which started on January 1, 2022 and will continue until 2026. I think it is worth sharing this information in detail on this festive occasion, because, for example, in 2023, the salary of a laboratory technician, engineer has already increased by 63 percent compared to 2018, the salary increase will continue and already in 2024 it will increase by 78 percent. The salary of a senior laboratory assistant and a senior engineer increased by 71 percent in 2023 compared to 2018, and in 2024 the increase will be 105 percent. The salary of a junior researcher increased by 75 percent in 2023 compared to 2018, and in 2024 the increase will be 110 percent. The salary of a researcher increased by 121 percent in 2023, and in 2024 the increase will be 154 percent. The salary of a senior researcher increased by 152 percent in 2023 compared to 2018, and will increase by 203 percent in 2024. The salary of a leading researcher increased by 206 percent in 2023 compared to 2018, and in 2024 the increase will be 267 percent.  The salary of the chief researcher in 2023 compared to 2018 increased by 226 percent, next year, in 2024, according to the already adopted budget, the increase will be 262 percent. The salary of the head of the scientific group increased by 117 percent in 2023 compared to 2018, in 2024 the increase will be 171 percent. The salary of the head of the scientific department increased by 183 percent in 2023 compared to 2018, in 2024 the increase will be 218 percent. That is, from January 1, and this process will continue until 2026.

After 2026, the results will be summarized and the government will make further decisions. In this regard, I think another innovation that we implemented is extremely important. From 2022, scientists and scientific teams receive grants in a competitive manner. They submit topics for funding, the competition committee accepts, discusses and grants are awarded. I want to emphasize that in 2023, grants totalling 8.4 billion AMD were awarded through these competitive grant programs. In 2024, the amount of grants from the state budget will be 9.3 billion AMD.

I want to emphasize that by the results of 2024, this grant program will affect about 1000 scientists. There are cases when the scientific team receives the grant, there are cases when individual scientists receive it. By this calculation, about 1,000 scholars will benefit from or be related to these grant programs. As a result of these actions and decisions, we see that a problem has started to move in positive direction, about which the president of the academy also spoke. According to our calculations, as a result of the launch of these programs, the number of people engaged in scientific activities in Armenia increased by around 296 scientists in 2022-23.  Moreover, most of them are scientists younger than 55 years old."

Referring to the next most important program, the Prime Minister mentioned the project of supplying scientific organizations with modern devices, launched in 2018. In the period between 2018 and 2022, 26 scientific organizations have acquired scientific devices worth about 5 billion AMD with government grants.

"I want to say, for example, for comparison, that in 2013-17, only 961 million AMD was allocated for this purpose. In other words, this investment direction has increased more than 5 times, but this is not all. As I said, in the previous period, we implemented it with grants, but starting from 2023, the acquisition of scientific devices has become a budget line in the state budget, and 5.1 billion AMD have been allocated for this purpose in the 2023 budget. For 2024, capital expenditures of 8.6 billion AMD have been set in the field of science in general. Currently, many competitions are already summerized, and we have 95 applications for equipment guaranteed for funding, with a total value of 7.1 billion AMD, which is more than the equipment purchased so far in the field of science. In other words, we are making capital expenditures in the field of science and human resource development, and with these current programs, about 3 dozen scientific organizations will receive these equipments," Nikol Pashinyan noted.  The Prime Minister added that the government does not expect words of thanks for all this, because these investments are made not so much for scientists, but for the Republic of Armenia and its future, because the government imagines the development of the Republic of Armenia with the most serious developments and reforms in the field of science.  "And as we did not imagine in the past, we do not imagine the Republic of Armenia in the future without a developed scientific and educational sphere, we see the strategic planning and the guarantee of the future of the Republic of Armenia in education and science," emphasized Nikol Pashinyan.

The Prime Minister thanked the President of the National Academy of Sciences for mentioning the "Academic City" program in his speech.  "Because, as Mr. Saghyan mentioned, it is a mega-project that should have a revolutionary significance in the field of higher education and science in Armenia.

But I don't want us to view higher education and science separate from primary school education and general education, because the separation there will have consequences. We see the reforms that we are implementing in the field of primary school, preschool education, general education, vocational education as part of this series. The "300 schools and 500 kindergartens" program has started. We are carrying out serious reforms in the field of vocational education and training, and reforms in all these areas are combined with the development of physical infrastructures and investments in human resources and personnel in the form of salary increases.  It is a very correct approach that in both science, public education, and many other fields, we link salary increases with the process of voluntary certification, because it is important for the government of the Republic of Armenia and the people to know that the funds of the state budget are spent and addressed to those people, who are properly qualified, have scientific, educational, professional ambitions, and this funding is truly a strategic investment in the future of the Republic of Armenia.

Summarizing all this, I cannot help but mention, on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the National Academy of Sciences, thank all law-abiding tax payers and all businessmen of the Republic of Armenia, because I am very happy that we have so much to present to the scientific community on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the Academy, but I must also emphasize that this would not be possible without working people, as economists like to say, creating added value and paying taxes. And I think that the 80th anniversary of the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia is also a celebration of those people.

Mr. Saghyan mentioned the practical consequence and result of the decision to create the National Academy of Sciences in Armenia in 1943. That result was clearly and unequivocally the industrialization of the Republic of Armenia. And I hope, and our strategic goal is that these investments in the field of science will similarly bring Armenia to the second industrialization, so to speak, in new times.  This is not possible without the cooperation of the government, the scientific community, the public education sector, and of course, the real economy, businessmen, working, producing, tax-paying people.

Once again, I congratulate all of us on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the National Academy of Sciences and wish all of us success on the way to preserving and strengthening the best traditions and realizing the prospect of having new traditions, new mechanisms, new quality and new achievements in line with the new times".  On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the National Academy of Sciences, Nikol Pashinyan awarded Anna Mkrtchyan, candidate of chemical sciences, the head of the asymmetric catalysis laboratory of the National Academy of Sciences "Haykensatechnologia", and Director of the Institute of Informatics and Automation Problems of the National Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Technical Sciences Hrachya Astsatryan with the Prime Minister's commemorative medal for their contribution to the development of education and science.  Next, the ceremony of awarding academician Victor Hambardzumyan 2020 was held international scientific award. The Prime Minister presented the award to Professors Alexander Sala, Isabelle Baraf and Adam Burroughs.

Next, the ceremony of awarding Victor Hambardzumyan international scientific award 2020 was held. The Prime Minister presented the award to Professors Alexander Sala, Isabelle Baraf and Adam Burroughs.

The International Scientific Award named after Academician Victor Hambardzumyan is one of the important awards in astronomy and astrophysics and related sciences. It is awarded to outstanding scientists of any country and nationality who have made a significant contribution to the field of physical and mathematical sciences. It has been awarded every two years since 2010.