Korea has produced its first chair of the APEC Policy Partnership on Science, Technology and Innovation (PPSTI).
The Ministry of Science and ICT said on the 5th that Senior Research Fellow Park Hwan-il of the Science and Technology Policy Institute (STEPI) was elected chair of PPSTI. The term runs from 2026 to 2027.
PPSTI is a key consultative body that advances APEC member economies' science and technology capacity building, fosters innovation ecosystems, and leads joint projects and public-private cooperation. Senior Research Fellow Park was nominated as chair by unanimous consent of 21 economies after a member vote and endorsement process that took about a month beginning in October.
The government expects that, with this election, Korea will take a more leading role in setting science and technology innovation policy agendas and in international coordination in the Asia-Pacific. The Ministry of Science and ICT, in particular, plans to steer follow-up science and technology discussions on the APEC "Gyeongju Leaders' Declaration" and to expand cooperative programs, including joint research across the region and talent capacity building.
Senior Research Fellow Park is a policy expert who has built more than 20 years of expertise in sustainable development, science and technology innovation policy, and international cooperation. Park received a master's and a doctorate in agricultural and applied economics from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and graduated from the Department of Food and Resource Economics at Korea University.
Park served as a senior researcher at the Samsung Economic Research Institute, head of the Policy Research Office at the Green Technology Center, and an expert member of the Green Growth Support Team at the Office for Government Policy Coordination (OPC), and has worked as a senior research fellow at STEPI since 2016. Notably, Park served as Director General of the Multilateral Cooperation Research Group from 2018 to 2020 and as Deputy Minister of the Global Innovation Strategy Research Headquarters from 2021 to 2024, strengthening the foundation for cooperation on national science and technology policy.
Park also served as PPSTI vice chair for the past five years, leading policy exchanges among member economies and the development of agendas.