Ameenah Rajab Farhan

KFAS has leveraged its investments to develop resilience plans, support online education and the healthcare sector, and contribute to local leadership and technological skills development.

What challenges and opportunities has KFAS encountered in recent years?

A challenge faced by KFAS in recent years, as for the entire world, was the global COVID-19 pandemic. As a promoter and a facilitator for science, technology, and innovation, leveraged its substantial investment in this field to develop a resilience plan that exemplified KFAS’ commitment to evidence-based science. Through that resilience plan, we supported and promoted online education among the public and universities. We also helped the health sector, whether through buying specific equipment for the pandemic or with research. During the pandemic, we issued the largest number of publications on the topic and other and social issues.

How does KFAS contribute to the local development of leadership and technological skills?

KFAS plays a pioneering role in supporting research and development in Kuwait through partnerships with prestigious international institutions. The KFAS partnership with Harvard University started in 2000 to enhance the capabilities of Kuwaiti researchers and academics. And since 2007, KFAS has partnered with the London School of Economics and Political Science to engage Kuwaiti researchers in vital research projects relevant to Kuwait. We have strong international collaborations with many prominent international work labs like IMEC. We partner with them to tackle energy issues and research. In 2023, we had our third IMEC conference at KFAS. In developing the youth, we have a special Chief Science Officer program that we established in 2017. This program promotes science, prepares students to experiment in scientific activities, and teaches how to present a case, or manage a project. We started the program in collaboration with the University of Arizona and have one phase for grades six to eight and a second for grades eight to 12. Its success reached to the extent that students from several Gulf countries joined us. Because of the importance of AI in our world, we have arranged with Korean Institutes a summer program on AI for high school students. We staged this in 2022 and 2023, with notable success. Students who attended the workshops in Korea have scored highly in other competitions even at the international level, which we are particularly proud of. We also have Science Month in Kuwait addressing everyone from children to early career scientists. Another of our events is the annual book fair in Mishref, through which we encourage scientific interest. In 2023, we had a symposium for the Harvard Business Club in the GCC, another of our successful events.

Could you highlight some of the aspects of the KFAS Innovation Program for 2022-24?

They are focused on advancing and demonstrating potential values for science, technology, and innovation; however, our focus is to ensure that the outcomes of our funding project or our activities create value in terms of impact. I do believe that if you want your research to flourish, you must support the spectrum, starting from fundamental sciences to innovative technology. You must build the base, and then invest more in innovative technologies accordingly. It is widely known that the grace period for any research outcomes is a lengthy period. We are trying to develop an innovation ecosystem. And we have other types of deployment of innovative technology. We are trying to be a future-ready organization. We succeeded during the pandemic, but must keep up with the changes taking place, especially concerning AI. AI is a tool that will expedite innovation, changing and reshaping our future. We are also focusing on our employees, who will ultimately leverage that technology. We support them through talent development for readiness for future challenges. We have a wide range of priorities. The first, which emerged during the pandemic, was education. Energy is another issue, which is always there with the environment and health issues. The Dasman Center for Diabetes Research is one of our institutions. We are focusing on digital transformation and food and water security which are vital topics.