President Lee Jae-myung attended the "Korea that once again dreams of being a community of scientists and engineers" public briefing and forum at the National Science Museum in Daejeon on the 7th and said, "With a policy to invest more in science and technology and research and development (R&D), we increased the R&D budget to an unimaginable scale," adding, "Through repeated discussions, we set several principles and decided to give researchers the freedom and the right to fail."
The event was held to explore ways for Korea to leap forward as a science and technology powerhouse by securing talent in science and technology. About 200 people, including undergraduate and graduate students in science and engineering, postdoctoral researchers, parents, and figures from industry, academia, and research, attended the public briefing, while from the government, Presidential Office Policy Chief Kim Yong-beom, Senior Secretary for AI Future Planning Ha Jung-woo, and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Ministry of Science and ICT Bae Kyung-hoon were present.
The presidential office said it was "an occasion to share with the public President Lee Jae-myung's strong determination to restore the science and technology ecosystem damaged by R&D budget cuts and to develop it further," adding that it was "prepared to listen to opinions from all walks of life, including students, the research community, and industry."
In his opening remarks, Lee said, "The decisive reason Korea became a country that the world admires economically, culturally, militarily, and politically in a short period is because the people studied hard," emphasizing that "the fundamental driving force of Korea's growth and development lay in learning."
Lee said, "The national community also needs to study, and what shows up in numbers is the R&D budget," adding, "With a policy to invest more in science and technology and R&D, we increased the R&D budget."
Lee said researchers would be given the freedom to fail. He said, "Among the things I heard from researchers, the most absurd was that the public R&D success rate exceeds 95%," adding, "Because public sector R&D investment must blaze new trails on difficult paths, I thought we should create an environment that tolerates failure."
Lee said, "If I had had the financial means when I was young to attend school normally, I would have become a researcher studying microbiology or nuclear physics," adding, "I hope Korea's young researchers will lean on the hill called the nation and create new hope."