Greetings from the World Science Forum!

I am Pyo, Wan Soo, President and CEO of YTN, and Chairman of the Organizing Committee of the World Science Forum.

Looking back at its recent history, in the past half century, Korea successfully overcame the devastating scars of the Korean War and has accomplished astonishing growth. Politically, it has achieved democracy. Economically, from being one of the poorest countries with a per capita income of 500 dollars, the nation is now at the threshold of becoming a developed country with a per capita income of 20,000 dollars. Korea is also steadily advancing to become a socio-culturally mature country.

The issue now is the half-century that lies before us. Learning from the trials and errors as well as its accomplishments of the past, Korea has now arrived at a point where it has no choice but to accept the challenge of becoming a full-fledged key player in the world. And to successfully deal with the challenge, scientific and technological development is vital, because science and technology is the most important key to making the transition from being a successful industrialized country to becoming a leading information and knowledge power. Only when a nation can reduce the scientific and technological gap with developed countries, and even surpass them, can it become a developed country itself.

The World Science Forum will be an important occasion to reflect on the policies needed for becoming a leading science country, and to raise the scientific awareness of the people. In this regard, world-renowned scholars will be invited to speak and offer their visions on the scientific and technological revolution that is taking place today. This year, for the Inaugural Forum, brain research has been selected as the theme as it is considered to be the field with the greatest potential to create added value in the 21st century. Developed countries have already identified such potential, and are investing heavily in brain research and in fusion technologies based on brain research. Korea also plans to invest over $1.5 billion in the coming decade in the aim of becoming the 7th “brain power” in the world. It would not be an overstatement to say that, in the future, the 'ranking of developed countries' will be determined based on the advancement of brain research of each country.

The World Science Forum is a non-commercial international conference of a purely academic nature, which aims to share the insight and visions of leading scholars on an important issue selected each year from the field of science and technology, ultimately contributing to expanding a nation’s science and technology base and becoming a scientific power.

I hope you will participate in World Science Forum 2008 Seoul, and join us in the first step toward becoming a leading scientific nation.