On October 23, Prof. Nebojsa Nakicenovic, former deputy director general and CEO of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), delivered a talk titled “The World in 2050--Transformations to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals” at National Taiwan University in a forum organized by the university’s Risk Society and Policy Research Center. Together with his wife, he made a special trip to the foundation today to exchange views with foundation staff on topics related to sustainable development.
Prof. Nakicenovic commended the Tang Prize for raising people’s awareness of the importance of a sustainable world and for creating four award categories, namely Sustainable Development, Biopharmaceutical Science, Sinology and Rule of Law, that can truly move forward with time. He noted that facing the challenges unique to the 21st century, people in the fields of science, social sciences and the humanities need to get together in a concerted effort to come up with feasible contingency plans, especially when we are tackling such a complex issue like sustainable development which is not only highly pertinent to our time but will also have far-reaching implications for our future. In this regard, he believes the cultural and academic diversity the Tang Prize embodies can be held up as a good example of international and inter-disciplinary collaboration.
Prof. Nakicenov is the current executive director of The World in 2050 (TWI2050), an initiative that is aimed at providing scientific evidence to endorse the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals as well as offering feasible solutions to help develop a good policy that can lead to the achievement of these goals. On 2018 and 2019 respectively, TWI2050 launched two reports, “Transformations to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals” and “The Digital Revolution and Sustainable Development: Opportunities and Challenges” to inform the world of their research results. Gifting the Foundation with a copy of each report, Prof. Nakicenov not only signed the front cover but also left a heartwarming message: “Very interesting and visionary activities of Tang Prize. Delightful Visit!”
