In a structural transformation era, we are now facing a series of new challenges, e.g. climate change, energy and resource scarcity, population aging, commoditization and low-profit margin of ICTs, globalization of R&D and manufacturing, limited government R&D budget, quality and quantity of higher education… “How to design and implement innovation policy to meets these grand challenges” is the most important agenda we like to address and discuss in the conference.

In recognition of the pressing challenges and needs of our society, and the possible role of innovation policy, the Department of Industrial Technology (DoIT) at the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) of Taiwan will host the 14th (2013) International Conference on Industrial Technology Innovation (ICITI) to initiate a discussion on innovation policy, and will explore relevant issues.

This conference, jointly organized by the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER), Chung-Hwa Institute of Economic Research (CIER), Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI), Commerce Development Research Institute (CDRI), and Institute of Information Industry (III), is a one-day event that will take place in Taipei, Taiwan on the September 5, 2013.

The ICITI has been held perennially since year 2000 and now is served as a significant policy-learning forum for MOFA. In the past, we had invited many prominent policy-makers, internationally renowned scholars and entrepreneurs as our honourable guests and speakers to generate meaningful insights. This year we will carry on this tradition and hope that the conference would help us design better innovation policy to meet future challenges in the structural transformation era.