International collaboration is vital to efforts to harness scientific research to tackle vital issues such as climate change and the future of health care, an Emirati minister said at the World Economic Forum on Monday.
Speaking at a session titled Safeguarding Global Scientific Collaboration, Sarah Al Amiri, Minister of State for Public Education and Future Technology and chairwoman of the UAE Space Agency, highlighted that most issues addressed by science were global rather than local.
She told the five-person panel discussion in Davos, Switzerland, that it was important to build collaboration into research agendas.
“One of our key objectives of research and development is to utilise international collaboration as a mechanism to increase the impact and outcomes of science,” said Ms Al Amiri, who was appointed to her new ministerial position on Sunday.
Because many issues that science deals with, such as climate change, health care and coastline transformation, are global, Ms Al Amiri said there need not be any tension between national objectives and global scientific collaboration.
It was also vital, she told delegates, to ensure scientific funding was consistent, regardless of changes in government priorities.
“Science is long term and solving issues needs to be long term,” she said.
“There are not aspects that you can pick and choose or change year-on-year or every five years.”
Scientists should help set global agenda
Ms Al Amiri said scientists should have an input into government scientific policy, highlighting that in the UAE several advisory groups for particular areas of science had been set up to determine national priorities.
“Scientists have a say when it comes to the division of the priority areas,” she said.
“They have a voice on the table so it doesn’t become a single top-down lens and doesn’t become a lens driven by industry … ensuring every voice is equal.”
While governments should fund fundamental science, Ms Al Amiri said they should also demonstrate “actionable on-the-ground changes” that resulted from research, as this could make the public understand the importance of science.
Helping public understand value of research
On a similar theme, Prof Maria Leptin, president of the European Research Council, said more should be done to ensure the public understood how science worked, as this could make them value research findings.
“What I would do is make every child begin to learn in kindergarten the value of the scientific method,” Prof Leptin said.
“The reason we have mistrust from society in science is because society does not understand the scientific method. It does not understand what our ‘truth’, which they doubt, is based on.”
Dr Magdalena Skipper, editor-in-chief of scientific journal Nature, who chaired the session, suggested that publications such hers carried out “curation and synthesis” of scientific research to ensure the findings of research were understood and gaps in knowledge highlighted.
Covid-19 shows importance of unity
Discussing openness and collaboration, another speaker, Dan Vahdat, co-founder and chief executive of healthcare technology company Medopad, said there were clear examples where a lack of scientific co-operation was harmful.
“There’s a huge competitiveness between scientists, between healthcare providers, between hospitals that are sources of science and so on,” he said.
“Sometimes they don’t share care pathways that can lead to saving lives. That’s why you go to … institution X in the US because they do cancer management of breast cancer better because they use a very unique care pathway that some university hospital in the UK doesn’t, or vice versa.”
He said researchers could “do more” when it came to co-operating and sharing data, citing international scientific co-operation during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Scientific research should, he said, be open source and free to access, in contrast to the current situation, where some journals charge hefty fees for material to be read.
One factor that could hamper scientific collaboration, said Dr Fabiola Gianotti, a researcher from Italy who is director general of the CERN particle physics research centre in Switzerland, is “a global decline of trust”.
“Governments [or] countries sometimes are not collaborating as they should be doing,” she said.
“It’s also interesting to note that science can build trust but science without openness and trust is not successful.”
Some problems of collaboration and trust between governments when it came to science resulted from the dual use of technology, Dr Gianotti said, a likely reference to the possibility that inventions could sometimes be adapted for, in particular, military purposes.
It was nevertheless important, Dr Gianotti said, for countries to ensure that researchers were able to collaborate with scientists abroad, even when their respective governments were “not friends”.
The Bloomberg Billionaire Index in full
1 Jeff Bezos $140 billion
2 Bill Gates $98.3 billion
3 Bernard Arnault $83.1 billion
4 Warren Buffett $83 billion
5 Amancio Ortega $67.9 billion
6 Mark Zuckerberg $67.3 billion
7 Larry Page $56.8 billion
8 Larry Ellison $56.1 billion
9 Sergey Brin $55.2 billion
10 Carlos Slim $55.2 billion
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Engine: 5.6-litre V8
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Europe’s rearming plan
- Suspend strict budget rules to allow member countries to step up defence spending
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- Engage the bloc's European Investment Bank to drop limits on lending to defence firms
- Create a savings and investments union to help companies access capital
The specs: 2018 Nissan 370Z Nismo
The specs: 2018 Nissan 370Z Nismo
Price, base / as tested: Dh182,178
Engine: 3.7-litre V6
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Roll of honour: Who won what in 2018/19?
West Asia Premiership: Winners – Bahrain; Runners-up – Dubai Exiles
UAE Premiership: Winners – Abu Dhabi Harlequins; Runners-up – Jebel Ali Dragons
Dubai Rugby Sevens: Winners – Dubai Hurricanes; Runners-up – Abu Dhabi Harlequins
UAE Conference: Winners – Dubai Tigers; Runners-up – Al Ain Amblers
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Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
Tamkeen's offering
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Ten tax points to be aware of in 2026
1. Domestic VAT refund amendments: request your refund within five years
If a business does not apply for the refund on time, they lose their credit.
2. E-invoicing in the UAE
Businesses should continue preparing for the implementation of e-invoicing in the UAE, with 2026 a preparation and transition period ahead of phased mandatory adoption.
3. More tax audits
Tax authorities are increasingly using data already available across multiple filings to identify audit risks.
4. More beneficial VAT and excise tax penalty regime
Tax disputes are expected to become more frequent and more structured, with clearer administrative objection and appeal processes. The UAE has adopted a new penalty regime for VAT and excise disputes, which now mirrors the penalty regime for corporate tax.
5. Greater emphasis on statutory audit
There is a greater need for the accuracy of financial statements. The International Financial Reporting Standards standards need to be strictly adhered to and, as a result, the quality of the audits will need to increase.
6. Further transfer pricing enforcement
Transfer pricing enforcement, which refers to the practice of establishing prices for internal transactions between related entities, is expected to broaden in scope. The UAE will shortly open the possibility to negotiate advance pricing agreements, or essentially rulings for transfer pricing purposes.
7. Limited time periods for audits
Recent amendments also introduce a default five-year limitation period for tax audits and assessments, subject to specific statutory exceptions. While the standard audit and assessment period is five years, this may be extended to up to 15 years in cases involving fraud or tax evasion.
8. Pillar 2 implementation
Many multinational groups will begin to feel the practical effect of the Domestic Minimum Top-Up Tax (DMTT), the UAE's implementation of the OECD’s global minimum tax under Pillar 2. While the rules apply for financial years starting on or after January 1, 2025, it is 2026 that marks the transition to an operational phase.
9. Reduced compliance obligations for imported goods and services
Businesses that apply the reverse-charge mechanism for VAT purposes in the UAE may benefit from reduced compliance obligations.
10. Substance and CbC reporting focus
Tax authorities are expected to continue strengthening the enforcement of economic substance and Country-by-Country (CbC) reporting frameworks. In the UAE, these regimes are increasingly being used as risk-assessment tools, providing tax authorities with a comprehensive view of multinational groups’ global footprints and enabling them to assess whether profits are aligned with real economic activity.
Contributed by Thomas Vanhee and Hend Rashwan, Aurifer
If you go
The flights
There are direct flights from Dubai to Sofia with FlyDubai (www.flydubai.com) and Wizz Air (www.wizzair.com), from Dh1,164 and Dh822 return including taxes, respectively.
The trip
Plovdiv is 150km from Sofia, with an hourly bus service taking around 2 hours and costing $16 (Dh58). The Rhodopes can be reached from Sofia in between 2-4hours.
The trip was organised by Bulguides (www.bulguides.com), which organises guided trips throughout Bulgaria. Guiding, accommodation, food and transfers from Plovdiv to the mountains and back costs around 170 USD for a four-day, three-night trip.
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