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A move by life scientists in the Asia-Pacific region to form a network to promote biotechnology and biomedical research has won strong political endorsement from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum (see Nature 388, 3; 1997).

At a meeting of APEC's working group on industrial science and technology in Singapore last week, a motion by South Korea to support the network won backing from eight APEC members: Japan, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Taiwan.

Gurinder Shahi of the International Vaccine Institute in Seoul, who attended the meeting as a representative of the secretariat of the proposed International Molecular Biology Network for Asia and the Pacific Rim, says delegates from the United States and New Zealand also informally expressed support.

APEC's endorsement will not automatically be translated into financial backing, as the forum operates on a very limited budget. But it will give the network the political authority to begin work on a draft intergovernmental agreement, modelled along the lines of that setting up the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO), many of whose characteristics the new network hopes to emulate.

Even with APEC's support, the experience of the vaccine institute suggests that it could take a long time to establish and ratify such an agreement. Meanwhile, funds are being sought from other sources — perhaps some of the institutes in the region that have expressed their support, as well as the private sector.

A task force of seven scientists from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, China, Hong Kong and New Zealand will meet next month in Shanghai, at the Institute of Biochemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, to discuss fund-raising and future strategy.

The network's founding members favour membership based on individuals selected for their excellence, rather than on institutions, as initially proposed at a meeting in Tokyo in June. Each country will probably propose about 10 members, and EMBO may be called in to advise on the final membership list. Shahi says it is hoped that the membership issue will be settled before a conference is held by the network in South Korea next June.