Challenging existing ideas key to creative economy

Dan Shechtman, the winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2011, speaks during a lecture on innovation and entrepreneurship at the Seoul Garden Hotel in Mapo on Dec. 10. The Israeli materials scientist sat down with The Korea Times for an interview after the lecture. / Courtesy of Israeli Embassy

Nobel laureate calls on Korea to strengthen science, engineering education

By Kang Hyun-kyung

Don’t fear failure; you can start again.

A Nobel laureate has proposed this as a motto for aspiring entrepreneurs in Korea, noting that cultivating an entrepreneurial spirit is important for helping people start their own business.

Professor Dan Shechtman, who won the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 2011 for his discovery of quaslcrystals, commented that Korean students are smart but lack challenging minds.

“Korean students are hard working, talented and they do what they need to do. They succeed in exams. They are highly motivated to succeed in tests,” Shechtman said during an interview with The Korea Times on Dec. 10 at Seoul Garden Hotel in Mapo.

He taught at Seoul National University during the fall semester and will teach there again during the spring semester next year.

The globally-renowned materials scientist shared his views of the creative economy after he gave a lecture about innovation and entrepreneurship during a Korea-Israel ICT Seminar held at the hotel.

“As far as innovation goes, I can tell you that Korean students are reluctant to step out of line. If I ask questions, nobody raises their hands not because they don’t know the answers, but because they don’t want to step out of line,” Shechtman said.

Shechtman, also a distinguished professor of materials science at Israeli Institute of Technology based in Haifa, also known as “Technion,” says President Park’s creative economy is the right vision to take the Korean economy to the next level.

“We need high-tech startups to move the economy forward and to raise per capita gross domestic product (GDP),” he noted.

Shechtman says that entrepreneurship and strong science and engineering are the two key vehicles which will lead President Park Geun-hye’s creative economy to succeed.

In the face of a shrinking population, the Nobel laureate says that Korea needs to come up with a set of measures to increase labor productivity dramatically.

“Everybody has to produce more per capita GDP to achieve sustainable economic growth in an era of shrinking population. This will be done by technological entrepreneurship with a focus on innovation. Sustainable development requires human ingenuity,” he said. “People are the most important resource.”

Since the 1990s, Korea has experienced a falling birthrate despite the government’s efforts to counter the drop. It stood at 1.45 in 2000 and fell to 1.19 in 2012, the lowest birthrate in the world.

Shechtman says that the falling birthrate is an unintended result of several positive changes made in society over recent decades.

Education for women and urbanization are two of the three main factors which led to population reducation in Korea. Another factor was the government policy to control birthrates in the 1970s, said the scientist.

As educated women and urbanization are positive elements, Shechtman says, nobody will want to stop them in the name of a boosting birthrate.

Instead, the Israeli scientist says the nation will want to fight the negative fallouts of falling birthrates by countering factors they can control.

If governmental policies turn out to be ineffective, Shechtman says then policymakers should find alternative ways to raise labor productivity.

He says scientists and engineers are the key people who can play a pivotal role in raising the nation’s GDP. He therefore believes that President Park’s creative economy is a move in the right direction.

The creative economy is based on the notion that highly successful startups armed with innovative ideas will help the Korean economy achieve another economic miracle, despite a daunting global economic outlook.

Under this vision, the Park government came up with a set of supportive measures for aspiring entrepreneurs.

Venture boom

The growing interest in startup companies comes at a time when the number of newly-created companies has soared over the past five years. Approximately 2,500 small companies have been created every year during this period; the number of startups in Korea marked over 30,000 last year.

Industry experts call the surge of startups the second wave of the venture boom, following the first one in 2000 shortly after the Korean economy was hit hard by the Asian Financial Crisis in the late 1990s.

The first venture boom was short-lived. Among several reasons, experts say, the Kim Dae-jung government’s spending-oriented policy was responsible for this failure.

Despite an increase of startups in recent years, the rate of new ventures that survive is very low. Only one in every 100 new companies become a medium-sized company years after they were founded.

In a report released in 2012, Kim Ki-wan, senior fellow of the state-run think tank Korea Development Institute, called for a shift in governmental policy direction from a spending-oriented vision to building a strong business-friendly environment for startups.

He proposed that the government look to the United States or Israel to learn how these two economies were able to benefit from the sustainable venture boom.

The rates of successful startups in those countries are much higher than that in Korea.

According to the Embassy of Israel in Korea, over 700 new companies are created every year in Israel and nearly half of them survive and prosper next year.

Shechtman says that Korea and Israel can learn from each other. The Israeli scientist says Korea has global conglomerates whereas Israel has strong startups and both sides can benefit if they work together.

Shechtman encourages the Korean government to include entrepreneurship on the high school curriculum, noting that Israel’s experience proves this helps young entrepreneurs reduce errors.

“Young people in Israel are encouraged to design, produce and sell their products from high school. Technical universities also matter. Teach and introduce entrepreneurship courses in technical universities,” he said.

“We need to encourage young people to pursue careers as engineers or scientists because they are the ones who create startups.”

Regarding the government’s engagement in science and engineering education, the renowned scientist says the sooner the better.

“If you want more engineers and scientists, you need to start very early. How early? Start teaching science in the kindergarten at age five.”

Since then presidential candidate Park unveiled the creative economy as her economic vision during the 2012 presidential campaign season, it has drawn mixed reactions from experts.

Some commentators say the government is heading in the right direction.

But others question if there is substance in the creative economy and say that the Park government has failed to present a detailed roadmap for the vision.

They also claim that it remains unclear how the vision will help the Korean economy attain a high level of economic growth amid the current financial outlook around the world global.

President Park has countered this criticism. On Nov. 27, she called on the nation to join hands in order to make the creative economy work.

“I know there are some people who are skeptical about the creative economy. I think these people have never made efforts to understand what the vision is about. I urge them to keep trying to make things happen, instead of remaining inactive and keeping suspicious of it.”

Park vowed to expand financial support for startup businesses. The government plans to spend 4 trillion won by 2017 to help aspiring entrepreneurs start their own businesses.