Heads of World 20 Ocean Institutes Gather in Seoul

SEOUL, Jan. 23, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The abnormal cold waves that swept through the global community found to be deeply related to the ocean phenomenon.

In the midst of this, information sharing meeting has been arranged for leaders of world ocean research institutes, which is garnering attention.

Korea Ocean Research & Development Institute (KORDI, President Jung-Keuk Kang) announced that it will be hosting the 12th Partnership for Observation of the Global Oceans Annual Meeting (POGO-12) on January 24 (Monday, 9am) at The Plaza Hotel Seoul. The annual meeting of POGO boasts of its grand scale as it is referred to as the 'G20' of ocean research.

This will be the first time POGO annual meeting is held in South Korea and the 3-day long meeting (January 24-26) will be participated by the heads of ocean research institutes from 20 different countries of the world.

The participating countries include the US, the UK, Japan, China, Russia, etc. Additionally, the ocean research institutes from the Republic of South Africa, Chile and Saudi Arabia are also expected to participate.

KORDI expects that this meeting will become a foundation for developing the pan-global ocean observation system by dealing with ocean related issues from around the world.

According to KORDI, the heads of major ocean institutes that will be participating in POGO-12 are already showing interest on the Korea's Chollian satellite and Araon icebreaker.

For instance, the UK's major ocean research institute Plymouth Marine Laboratory (PML) has shown keen interest in Chollian, the world's first oceanographic observation satellite in geostationary orbit, successfully launched in June 2010, and requested cooperation for joint study of the Chollian satellite data.

Taking advantage of this opportunity of POGO-12, KORDI plans to take the domestic ocean science research into a higher level through its continuous collaboration with the world's major ocean research institutes by signing MOU to officialize such effort of collaboration.

"This is the first time Korea is hosting POGO annual meeting, testifying to the fact that Korea's status has elevated and Korea is being recognized as a partner in the international joint studies in the area of ocean observation", said President Jung-Keuk Kang while also expressing his expectation for the meeting: "Through this meeting, I expect for closer cooperations and international joint studies on solving ocean related issues such as climate change and ocean disasters."

SOURCE Korea Ocean Research & Development Institute