WASH­ING­TON-The Per­ma­nent Coun­cil of the Or­gan­i­sa­tion of Amer­i­can States (OAS) on Wednes­day re­ceived a re­port on the Parks of Cre­ativ­i­ty in the Amer­i­c­as, an ini­tia­tive to fos­ter sci­en­tif­ic in­no­va­tion in or­der to achieve eco­nom­ic de­vel­op­ment, and al­so com­mem­o­rat­ed the bi­cen­ten­ni­al of the Span­ish Con­sti­tu­tion of Cadiz in 1812.

Doc­tor Raul Cuero, chair­man and founder of the In­ter­na­tion­al Park of Cre­ativ­i­ty for Young In­ven­tors of Colom­bia, ex­plained that the pur­pose of the parks is "to in­vent, reg­is­ter patents and cre­ate com­pa­nies," adding that "the coun­tries of Latin Amer­i­ca need cre­ativ­i­ty."

"To­day in­no­va­tion is al­ways pro­mot­ed, but we keep in mind that for de­vel­op­ing coun­tries, like those in Latin Amer­i­ca, in­no­va­tion does not suit them, rather in­ven­tion, be­cause in­ven­tion is the abil­i­ty to cre­ate from noth­ing based in na­ture, and in­no­va­tion is to trans­form what an­oth­er man has done," said the renowned in­ven­tor.

The Parks of Cre­ativ­i­ty for the Amer­i­c­as, head­quar­tered in Colom­bia, the Unit­ed States and Is­rael, have led to sci­en­tif­ic ad­vances in ar­eas as di­verse as Alzheimer's, wa­ter treat­ment, the study of DNA and the fight against skin can­cer. Cuero said that Latin Amer­i­ca should take ad­van­tage of the youth of its pop­u­la­tion to sig­nif­i­cant­ly boost its de­vel­op­ment. He al­so urged au­thor­i­ties to strength­en the role of women with­in the cre­ative process.

"Women are an as­set that has been mis­used in Latin Amer­i­ca," he said. The Colom­bian in­ven­tor al­so pre­sent­ed one of his stu­dents, Gabriela Me­lo, a 20-year-old Colom­bian who in­vent­ed a bi­o­log­i­cal foam with nu­mer­ous ap­pli­ca­tions in in­dus­tri­al sys­tems, such as ther­mal in­su­la­tion for con­struc­tion, avi­a­tion, cars and fur­ni­ture as­sem­bly.

The sec­re­tary gen­er­al of the OAS, Jos&ea­cute; Miguel In­sulza, praised the work done by the Parks of Cre­ativ­i­ty and said that "sci­en­tif­ic and tech­no­log­i­cal in­no­va­tion, as well as the de­vel­op­ment of young peo­ple, are among the pri­or­i­ties of the or­gan­i­sa­tion."

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