Brazil’s Ministries of Science and Technology, and of Social Development and Hunger Alleviation, in partnership with 11 public, private, and non-governmental entities launched this Thursday (14), in BrasÀlia, the Social Technology Network.
The objective is to integrate institutions that work with technology and focus on the generation of jobs and income, as well as on the promotion of social inclusion.
During the ceremony, the Minister of Science and Technology, Eduardo Campos, stated that the idea is to extend to other regions of the country successful experiences and creative low-cost solutions, in a way to primarily benefit lowest income population.
At the end of last year, the 1st Forum on Women in the Technology Field held in the city of São Luis, in the state of Maranhão, proposed to change society’s vision of engineering by enhancing awareness about women’s participation in the technological sphere and assigning the hard sciences a central role in the process of social inclusion.
“It is engineering, architecture, and agronomy that builds houses, projects bikelanes, and takes care of the Amazon. And Brazil needs these technological areas for its social development,” said the organizer of the Forum, Deodete Packer, a mechanical engineer.
She underscored that women were responsible for projects that placed Brazil among the countries in which high technology is developed, but they ended up not receiving the recognition they deserved.
“Victória Rossetti, who is an agronomical engineer, was the most important force behind Brazil’s Genome project. But she lives in the countryside and loves the land, and few people know who she is,” Packer affirms.
Last year year, all the categories of the National Council of Scientific and Technological Development’s(CNPq) Young Scientist award were won by women.
Agência Brasil
