On July 4, as
part of the Central American Book Fair at ATLAPA, the City of
Knowledge’s Dr. Jorge Arosemena spoke on “The Goals
and Accomplishments of the City of Knowledge.” The civil
engineer, sociologist, former head of the IPAT travel bureau,
vice-rector of the University of Panama and former education
minister explained the institution’s origin in a 1998 law
that created a private foundation to transform part of the
former Fort Clayton into “a center of excellence in
science, technology and innovation.”
As “a
state
initiative administered by a private foundation,”
Arosemena
said that the City of Knowledge has enjoyed good support from
the Moscoso administration and is beginning to create “an
international community in which the academic, scientific and
business communities interact.”
The project has
a reputation as a PRD enclave, but when looking at the
Panamanians involved on the foundation’s board it
can’t be dismissed as only that, and moreover,
they’re
not looking to divide turf among the usual suspects but rather
to create an international entity. “Attracting people from
outside was always key,” Arosemena said. “Just within
Panama we can’t get all the people we need to become what
we want to be.
The City of
Knowledge has joint academic programs with Florida Atlantic
University, Florida State, SMU, Cornell, the University of
California at Davis, Texas A&M, Iowa State, McGill,
Universidad San Martin, St. Clair College, Williams College and
Tulane. The Peregrine Fund, the ISTHMUS architectural institute
and the George Westerman Center also add to the project’s
academic offerings.
Arosemena
thinks
that Panama’s location at the intersection of five major
undersea fiber optic cables may one day may be of more economic
relevance than the Panama Canal, and at the moment it makes the
City of Knowledge one of the world’s best-connected spots
from the telecommunications point of view. For that reason, it
has attracted international call centers and the new
Telecarrier
phone company to its premises. The technological park at
Clayton
is now home to 27 businesses. Probably the most successful one
is Arango Software, a Panamanian company that now occupies the
old Clayton hobby center, from which it asserts itself as a
major international player in the field of banking software.
Arosemena said that a laboratory that can do DNA and materials
analyses --- something that Panama doesn’t currently have -
-
- is on the way.
A major part of
the City of Knowledge’s income is derived from being the
landlord for international organizations, several of which have
opened their regional offices at Clayton.
Another key
component of the City of Knowledge is a business incubator
program, in which new businesses, usually in the high tech
sector, are helped to get off the ground. Arosemena says that
his goal is for 90 businesses in the incubator within six
years,
with the understanding that some of them will fail and the
bottom line being some 700 jobs.
Also in this
section:
Business & Economy Briefs
Seguro Social
strike
The Panamanian
Diaspora
City of
Knowledge
