NEWSROOM

A full year has passed since the February 6th earthquakes, yet the wounds caused by the earthquake continue to be healed. With the awareness of being an earthquake-prone country, many inter-institutional collaborations are carried out to increase the economic and social benefits that the private sector can provide against possible disasters and emergency scenarios. Thus, academia, industry, and civil society are preparing projects for disaster coordination.

TURKEY - Although only a year has passed since the earthquakes centered in Kahramanmaraş and Hatay on February 6th, the healing of the wounds caused by the earthquake continues. While aid campaigns continue nationwide, inter-institutional collaborations also allow for the development of preventive strategies against possible disasters. With the aim of increasing the economic and social benefits that the private sector can provide, the Founders Coordination Meeting of the Disaster and Emergency Technologies Platform (AFETTEK), which includes founders from TED University (TEDU), was held at the university on January 26th.

Stating that the next meeting will be held in Ankara Industrial Chamber 1st Organized Industrial Zone on February 22nd, TEDU Rector Prof. Dr. İhsan Sabuncuoğlu said, "In the coordination meetings, we plan to make effective collaborations and innovative works with a value chain-focused and ecosystem approach for the next 5 years. We aim to form more effective collaborations in the field of social responsibility in the future."

"We adopt a value chain-focused ecosystem approach"

On the anniversary of the earthquake, the AFETTEK Platform made a statement: "This great destruction has once again painfully shown how fragile we are against disasters and emergencies. To prevent such disasters from happening again, all segments of our society need to take serious responsibility. Being prepared and resilient to fight against disasters and emergencies, taking risk-preventive measures, and creating the necessary infrastructure are essential. It is important to develop and produce products, services, and technologies for this purpose and to train human resources with the necessary competencies for a possible disaster scenario," it was said.
"We recently made a clustering application to the Ministry of Industry and Technology. This clustering has a vision that focuses on the value chain approach to prevent and reduce the destructive effects of disasters and emergencies, focusing on technology, products, services, and knowledge. It is innovative, high-performance, open to global markets, and creates societal benefit. While we remember our citizens who we lost in the earthquake on this anniversary, we also increase our efforts to build a healthy and safe society after the earthquake. While sharing our pain, we would like to express our commitment to our country and our spirit of solidarity within our corporate responsibilities once again. We can overcome any difficulty and build a safer future when we stand together in solidarity," the message was given.

The 6th meeting was hosted by TEDU

The 6th Founders Coordination Meeting on January 26th, hosted by TEDU, was attended by officials from Capital, Sabancı, and İzmir Economy Universities, Ankara Industrial Chamber 1st OIZ, OSTIM OIZ, OSTIM Medical Industry Clustering, Başkent University BIOTEK Technology Development Center, Science Tree Foundation, TEPAV Turkey Economic Policies Research Foundation, and AKUT. At the 5th Founders Coordination Meeting on November 17th, where TEDU Rector Prof. Dr. İhsan Sabuncuoğlu gave the opening speech, AFETTEK provided information about the clustering application and short-term work to be done in 2024."