Muscat: On Thursday, the talk show ‘With Youth’ hosted His Excellency Dr. Bakhit bin Ahmed Al Mahri, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Higher Education, Scientific Research and Innovation for Higher Education, and Dr. Saif bin Abdullah Al Hadabi, Undersecretary of the Ministry for Scientific Research and Innovation, to talk about “Higher Education, Scientific Research and Innovation”.
Dr. Al Mahri said, “Oman Vision 2040 targets universities and colleges to advance them so that at least 3 universities rank in the top 300 universities in the world in the year 2040. This will not be achieved without effort.”
“The existence of scientific research as a sector with innovation and linking it with higher education is an important and supportive step in this sequence. The quality of education means the quality of scientific research and the quality of innovation outputs.”
He added that in his opinion private universities in the Sultanate of Oman were not profitable in spite of the great effort they are making.
“There are 9 institutions in the higher education sector that have obtained academic accreditation out of 28 institutions, and there are institutions that have not yet applied for academic accreditation.”
Dr. Al Hadabi, said that the total expenditure on scientific research amounted to about OMR 66 million, according to the latest survey of science and technology indicators submitted by the Sultanate of Oman to UNESCO.
His Excellency Undersecretary of the Ministry of Higher Education, Scientific Research and Innovation for Higher Education, said that there is a continuous review of curricula and teaching methods in higher education institutions, and these institutions play a major role in this aspect.
Dr. Al Mahri added that the Sultanate of Oman at the international level in global innovation indicators, ranked 13th globally in spending on education and first in the level of engineering and science outputs globally.
