Minister WAN Gang received a Turkish delegation headed by State Minister Mehmet Aydin on March 20, 2008.

WAN welcomed Minister Aydin’s visit and elaborated on the S&T programs run by MOST, and achievements of China in the scientific areas over the past few years such as the manned space flight, the high-performance computer, the 3G technology, and breakthroughs in tackling climate change, energy conservation and emissions reduction. Minister WAN also highlighted the remarkable contributions made by the national hi-tech zones to China’s economy.

Dr. Mehmet Aydin expressed keen interest in Minister WAN’s introduction and compared notes with his Chinese counterparts on the role of public and private sectors in developing basic sciences and high technologies. He spoke frankly about the fact that Turkey had been closely following China’s S&T advancement and appreciated what MOST had achieved. Given the absence of a Ministry of Science and Technology in Turkey, the Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey is in change of S&T undertaking. The Turkish government is studying the possibility of establishing a similar ministry in line with the Chinese pattern.

The two ministers exchanged views on the participation in EU’s Framework Program (FP) and agreed that the China-Turkey cooperation should be strengthened within this framework by joint application to FP projects.