The University of Indonesia (UI) and ETH Zurich, through the Future Cities Laboratory at the Singapore-ETH Centre, have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to work together on urban research and projects
he University of Indonesia (UI) and ETH Zurich, through the Future Cities Laboratory at the Singapore-ETH Centre, have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to work together on urban research and projects.
The agreement, which was signed earlier this week during a symposium titled 'Future City Jakarta: Swiss and Indonesian Research and Technology in Practice', officially kicked off the partnership.
Singapore-ETH Centre managing director Remo Burkhard said that the agreement was aimed at formalizing cooperation between the two institutions, which began in 2010.
'We have been working together with UI since the inception of our research center in 2010, but we never signed a formal agreement,' Burkhard told The Jakarta Post after the signing, which was held at an auditorium in UI's campus in Depok, West Java.
He continued by explaining that the center aimed to highlight cooperation on the level of research.
The collaboration will include joint research on urban issues, capacity-building and urban projects.
'We want to exchange people. People from UI will come to Singapore and [people] from Singapore will come to Indonesia. We will also have people from Switzerland coming to Indonesia and from Indonesia to Zurich.'
'Second, we want to do projects like the one we conducted today. Such an event needs a lot of preparation. It was only successful because we had people from Indonesia and Switzerland who understood how one another thought and acted. That's the nature of what we would like to do going forward,' he said, adding that the exchange program would involve more than 35 researchers.
Burkhard emphasized that the cooperation would focus on urban issues and projects.
'We do not yet have finalized plans regarding the projects we will take on, but we would like to continue with what we presented [on today]: the Ciliwung river project, Tropical Town and also a series of events like this one.
'We will rent a space downtown where students, industry [...] can get inspired.
He said that the projects would be jointly funded by the two universities.
UI department of architecture researcher Herlily said that the team aimed to expand research on perennial urban issues, such as flooding.
'We want to find multidisciplinary alternatives to solving flooding and other environmental problems,' she said.
The Swiss ambassador in Jakarta, Yvonne Baumann, who was present during the symposium, applauded the MoU signing, saying that the cooperation would benefit both parties.
'We can make this a platform of knowledge-exchange between Swiss and Indonesian researchers. It is our hope that this [partnership] can generate feasible solutions [to be put] into practice and at the same time strengthen the relationship between Switzerland and Indonesia,' she said.
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