World Science Day for Peace and Development 2025; November 10th.

FORUM: "Trust, Transformation, and Tomorrow: The Science We Need for 2050." World Science Day for Peace and Development 2025. Join us live from the 43rd session of the UNESCO General Conference as we celebrate the day with a forward-looking conversation on the future of science. This event invites participants to reflect on what kind of science—and what kind of relationship between science and society—will be needed to meet the demands of the coming decades. Together, experts and policymakers will envision the scientific and societal landscape of 2050 and discuss how science can shape a more just, sustainable, and peaceful future. The General Conference is UNESCO’s highest decision-making body, gathering delegates from all 194 Member States every two years to set the Organization’s global priorities and guide its actions for peace, inclusion, and sustainable development. Through this dialogue, UNESCO reaffirms its leadership as the foundation of global scientific cooperation and the driving force behind the Science Decade for Action. To join the global conversation on the science we need for 2050; Follow the conversations with the hashtags: #Science4Policy, #sciencematters, #ScienceDay, #10November, #sustainableDevelopment, #WorldScienceDayforPeaceandDevelopment.

EVENT: On November 10th; 2025 from 1:15 pm - 2:50 pm, at the Room IX - Delegates Meeting Room #3 in Uzbekistan will celebrate the World Science Day for Peace and Development 2025 during the 43rd session of the UNESCO General Conference in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. Organized under the umbrella of the International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development (2024–2033), this event celebrates World Science Day for Peace and Development by fostering forward-looking dialogue on the evolution of science and its role in shaping a just, sustainable, and peaceful future.The Participants will be invited to envision the scientific and societal landscape of 2050 and reflect on, and make informed forecasts about, the evolving role of science in shaping a more just, sustainable, and peaceful future. Participants will consider how feasible this may be and what changes are required to achieve it. It will explore the foundations of a renewed social contract with science, one anchored in public trust, diversified funding sources, a transformed scientific paradigm, open science practices, ethical responsibility, and inclusive engagement.

Key discussion themes

• Disruptive technologies and the future of research: How artificial intelligence and emerging innovations are redefining the scientific paradigm.
• A renewed social contract with science: Building trust through transparency, ethics, open science, and inclusive participation.
• Envisioning science in 2050: Science as a driver of sustainability and peace.

Register to participate!

Agenda Programme

13:15 – 13:20 Opening remarks
Ms Lidia Brito, Assistant Director-General for Natural Sciences of UNESCO

13:20 – 13:35 Keynote speech
A renewed social contract with science
Ms Dilfuza Egamberdieva, Head of the Department of Biological Research and Food Safety at the Institute of Fundamental and Applied Research, National Research University, Uzbekistan
13:35 – 13:50 International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development
H.E. Ms Monique van Daalen, Co-Chair of the International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development and Ambassador of the Netherlands to UNESCO

13:50 – 14:40 Panel discussion

• The evolving role of science in shaping the future and a renewed social contract with science
• International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development (2024-2033)
• Engagement and trust in science
• Scientific paradigm transformation with applications of AI and other disruptive technologies
• The gender gap in science
• The role of the private sector in science

Q & A 
14:40 – 14:50  Closing remarks
H.E. Mr Samir Addahre, Chair of the Science Commission and Ambassador of the Kingdom of Morocco to UNESCO 

Message from Ms Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UNESCO, on the occasion of World Science Day for Peace and Development, 10 November 2025.

Science offers concrete solutions to the greatest challenges of our time: climate disruption, pandemics, resource scarcity and growing inequalities. It is a common good, a universal language, capable of bringing us together beyond borders and differences, linking knowledge to the pursuit of the collective good. Yet, in a world faced with widespread misinformation and distrust, we must come together to ensure that science is not reduced to a mere commodity or a political instrument. Science must instead be guided by ethics and solidarity, serving the common good. It is in this spirit that we celebrate World Science Day for Peace and Development under the theme “Trust, Transformation and Tomorrow: The Science We Need for 2050”. Trust cannot be demanded or decreed – it must be built. It grows through open and sustained dialogue between researchers, policymakers, private actors and citizens alike. Rebuilding trust in science lies at the heart of UNESCO’s 2021 Recommendation on Open Science, which calls for a global commitment to transparency, participation and accessibility. Through this recommendation, we can renew trust in science and ensure that it benefits all. But to produce the science of tomorrow, we must unlearn certain habits: we must move beyond silos – refusing to privilege certain forms of knowledge over others, or to confuse innovation with accumulation. Instead, we must relearn how to diversify, share, collaborate and listen. This means listening to researchers, but also to local and Indigenous peoples, whose insights and traditions enrich the collective understanding of our world. Only through active public participation can science truly serve everyone. To mark this year’s World Science Day, UNESCO is proud to publish a landmark anthology tracing 80 years of science at UNESCO, bringing together 46 essays by Nobel laureates, written for UNESCO between 1948 and today. It retraces the evolution of international scientific cooperation and diplomacy, the creation of leading institutions such as CERN and SESAME, the establishment of the Intergovernmental Hydrological Programme, and the development of global ethical frameworks on bioethics, artificial intelligence and neurotechnology. As part of the International Decade of Sciences for Sustainable Development (2024-2033), UNESCO is deepening this commitment by breaking down barriers in research, stimulating international cooperation and strengthening academic networks, and ensuring that science informs public policy at every level. On this World Science Day for Peace and Development, UNESCO reaffirms its conviction that open, inclusive, and ethical science – designed for the collective good – is the cornerstone of lasting peace.

UNESCO Director-General.

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World Science Day for Peace and Development 2012

Message from Ms Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO, on the occasion of World Science Day for Peace and Development 10 November 2012

World Science Day for Peace and Development is an opportunity for us to confirm the potential of the sciences to build a better world. It is through human intelligence, scientific research and innovation that we will be able find tomorrow the answers to the challenges that today seem insurmountable. Science is our best asset for supporting inclusive and equitable development, and for building global sustainability at a time of uncertainty, and faced with the biophysical limits of the planet.

In order to succeed, we must train today the researchers of tomorrow in greater numbers. We must also place science at the service of all, while observing the fundamental rights of the individual. Above all, we must open a new chapter in scientific integration. Innovation and social transformation depend on our capacity to combine disciplines and create synergies among all sciences, natural, human and social, including local and indigenous knowledge.

The complexity of issues today goes beyond the framework of any single discipline. The economic, environmental and social challenges of sustainable development are interconnected. This was the message of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development held earlier this year, in Rio de Janeiro. It was also the message of the report of the High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability:  Resilient People, Resilient Planet: A Future Worth Choosing. Although modern science has been able to prosper on the principle of specialization, it is now time to build more cooperative, better integrated approaches that can combine the progress made by each science in its own field. Sustainability will  come through multidisciplinarity. It DG/ME/ID/2012/026 – page 2also requires an improved interface between the sciences, policy and society, so that each may enrich and reinforce each other. 

That is the theme of the World Day this year, “Science for Global Sustainability Interconnectedness, Collaboration, Transformation”. 

UNESCO has made transdisciplinarity the cornerstone of its work for sustainability, in its international science programmes and in its work on education for sustainable development. Ten years after the first World  Science Day, UNESCO remains determined to support international reflection on a science of global sustainability, notably through the Scientific Advisory Board of the United Nations SecretaryGeneral. It is in this spirit that I call today on governments, civil society, public and private actors, well beyond scientific circles, to mobilize so as to release the full potential of all sciences for development and peace, which are inseparable and essential for the future that we want.Irina Bokova

UNESCO's Priorities for the XXI Century

Women and gender, science, engineering
and technology

"The gender dimension describes the way in which culturally organized differences between men and women interact with historically and socially diverse scientific and technological practices, and their meanings. Scientific and technological cultures and practices shape gendered social relations and, in turn, are shaped by them. Thus the S&T that each culture has are a consequence, in part, of local and global gender relations, and each cultureís gender relations are the effect, in part, of past local and global S&T changes"


World Science Report (UNESCO, 1996)



AFRICA     

• Millennial Perspective on Science, Technology and Development in Africa and its Possible Directions for the Twenty-first Century (Tunis Declaration)
  Fifth General Conference of the African Academy of Sciences 
  Hammamet, (Tunisia), 23–27 April 1999.
• Science and Technology in the SADC Region for the 21st Century
  Meeting of the Directors-General/Heads of Science and Technology in the SADC Region, Pretoria (South Africa), 20-21 April 1999.
• Basic Sciences for Development in Eastern and Southern Africa
  (Arusha Declaration)
  International Conference, Arusha (United Republic of Tanzania), 1-3 March 1999.
• Women, Science and Technology for Sustainable Development
  Third World Organization for Women in Science (TWOWS)
  Second General Assembly and International Conference,
  Cape Town (South Africa), 8-11 February 1999.
• Femmes, science et technologie -
  Rapport / Déclaration de Ouagadougou / Plan d'action régional
  Forum africain, Ougadougou (Burkina Faso), 25-28 janvier 1999.
  Women, Science and Technology -
  Report / Ouagadougou Declaration / Regional Plan of Action
  African Forum, Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), 25-28 January 1999.
• Première Conférence des Ministres chargés de la Recherche- Développement de l'Afrique de l'Ouest et du Centre (COMRED/AOC) Rapport Final / Rapport de la réunion des experts
  Yaoundé (Cameroun), 15-16 janvier 1999.
  First Conference of Ministers of Research and Development in West Africa and Central Africa (COMRED/AOC)
  Report of the Meeting of Experts
  Yaounde (Cameroon), 15-16 January 1999.
• First International Conference on the Role of Science and Technology in Development
  Zomba (Malawi), 7-11 December 1998.
• Sustainability and the 21st Century
  Regional Symposium, Stellenbosch (South Africa), 5-9 October 1998.
• The Development of Science and Technology in Africa
  International Conference, Durban (South Africa), 27-31 July 1998.
• Technology Education and Training
  International Symposium, Cape Town (South Africa), 26 June - 2 July 1998.
• Science and Technology for African Development: Partnership in a Global Economy
  International Symposium, Harare (Zimbabwe), 14-20 March 1998.

ARAB STATES

• Info-Ethics
  National Symposium, Cairo (Egypt), 27-28 April 1999.
• The Interaction  of Arab Women  with Science and Technology
  (Abu-Dhabi Declaration)
  Doha (United Arab Emirates), 24-26 April 1999.
  Les relations entre femmes arabes,sciences et technologies
  (Déclaration d'Abu Dhabi)
  Doha (Emirats arabes unis), 24-26 avril 1999.
• Regional Conference for Arab Ministers of Higher Education and Scientific Research
  Riyad (Saudi Arabia), 19 April 1999.
• Water and Desertification in the Arab Region
  First Arab Conference, Cairo (Egypt), 17-18 April 1999.
• The Present Status of Scientific Research in the Arab Region
  Expert Group Meeting, Beirut (Lebanon), 14-15 March 1999.
• Science and Technology Policies for the 21st Century
  STEMARN Regional Expert Group Meeting/Workshop,
  Beirut (Lebanon), 10-13 March 1999.
• Attitudes autour des sciences
  Colloque, Tunis (Tunisie), 27-28 janvier 1998.
• Third Arab Conference on Modern Biotechnology and Areas of Application in the Arab Countries
  Cairo (Egypt), 14-17 December 1998.
• Science, Technology and Society
  Conference, Beirut (Lebanon), 26-28 November 1998.
• The Public Understanding of Science
  International Conference for Scientific Editors,
  Sharm El-Sheikh, Sinai (Egypt) 9 June 1998.
• Femmes, science et technologie: état des lieux et perspectives
  Colloque international, Tunis (Tunisie), 20-22 November 1997.

ASIA AND PACIFIC

• NAM Meeting on World Conference on Science (Dhaka Communiqué)
  International Meeting, Dhaka (Bangladesh), 19-21 April 1999.
• Science and Society: a New Social Contract (Bangalore Communiqué)
  International Symposium, Bangalore (India), 27-29 January 1999.
• Second Science Centre World Congress
  Calcutta (India), 11-15 January 1999.
• Priorities for Science in the 21st Century for the Asia-Pacific Region
  Sydney Communiqué / Report of the Workshop 'Women and Gender, Science, Engineering and Technology'
  Regional Conference, Sydney (Australia), 1-5 December 1998.
  Priorités pour la science au 21ème sciècle en Asie-Pacifique
  -Rapport de l'atelier "Femmes, sciences, ingénierie et technologie"
  Conférence régionale, Sydney (Australie) 1-5 décembre 1998.
• The Basic Sciences in the Service of Societies: Challenges and Opportunities for Cooperation in Central Asia
  Regional Conference, Tashkent (Uzbekistan), 21-22 October 1998.

EUROPE AND NORTH-AMERICA

• Implementing Ecological Integrity : Restoring Regional and Global Environmental and Human Health
  International Workshop, Budapest (Hungary), 28-30 June 1999.
• Transition to Sustainability and FORUM BLED'99
  Regional European Meeting, Bled (Slovenia) 6-9 June, 1999
• Effects of Global Business on Scientific Research
  First Internationl Conference, Geneva (Switzerland), 3-4 June 1999.
• Science and Citizen
  International Symposium, Moscow (Russian Federation), 14-16 May 1999.
• Science, économie et société
  Conférence du Forum d'Engelberg , Paris (France), 7 mai 1999.
• Opportunities for Partnership within the Framework of
  the World Conference on Science
  Regional Workshop, Tbilisi (Georgia), 5-7 May 1999.
• Un siècle de Prix Nobel. Science et Humanisme
  Symposium international, Paris (France), 8-10 avril 1999.
  A Century of Nobel Prizes: Science and Humanism
  International Symposium, Paris (France), 8-10 April 1999.
• Promotion of the Role of Young People in the Development of Sciences
  and the Popularisation of Science Knowledge
  Third Central European Workshop, Prague (Czech Republic), 24-28 March 1999.
• Biotechnology and Society in the 21st Century
  International Conference, Genoa (Italy), 22-23 March 1999.
• Science for Survival and Sustainable Development
  Study Week of the Pontificial Academy of Science,
  Holy See, 12-16 March 1999
• The Future of Physics and Society
  International Workshop, Debrecen (Hungary), 4-6 March 1999.
• Femmes, sciences, biotechnologies : quel avenir pour la Méditérranée ? /
  Déclaration de Turin - Forum international des femmes de la Méditerranée
  Turin (Italie) 29-31 janvier 1999.
  Women, Science, Biotechnology : What does the Future Hold for the Mediterranean? /
  Turin Declaration International Mediterranean Women's Forum,
  Turin (Italy), 29-31 January 1999.
•  
• Universal Value of Fundamental Science. Science is outside of Boundaries
  Meeting of National Academies of sciences and scientific funds of countries of CIS and Eastern Europe, Minsk (Belarus), 14 January 1999.
• Science et développement : perspectives pour le 21ème siècle
  Colloque international, Bruxelles (Belgique), 3-4 décembre 1998. 
  Science and Development: Prospects for the 21st Century
  International Symposium, Brussels (Belgium), 3-4 December 1998. 
• Towards Wise Coastal Development Practice
  Intersectoral Workshop of Pilot Project Leaders, UNESCO,
  Paris (France), 30 November-4 December 1998.
• Women in Science - Quality and Equality. Conditions for
  Sustainable Human Development
  European Regional Conference, Bled (Slovenia), 5-7 November 1998.
• L'inscription sociale de la science
  Colloque européen, Paris (France), 5-6 novembre 1998.
• Le rôle de la science et de la technologie dans la société et la gouvernance
  Vers un nouveau contrat entre la science et la société
  Rencontre régionale nord-américaine, Alberta (Canada), 1-3 novembre 1998.
  The Role of Science and Technology in Society and Governance
  Toward a New Contract between Science and Society
  North American Regional Meeting, Alberta (Canada), 1-3 November 1998.
• Developing Practices and Standards for Electronic Publishing in Science
  American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)/International Council for Science Press (ICSU Press)/UNESCO Workshop, UNESCO,
  Paris (France), 12-14 October 1998.
• The Discovery of Polonium and Radium - its Scientific and Philosophical Consequences. Benefits and Threats to Mankind
  International Conference, Warsaw (Poland), 17-20 September 1998.
• Russian Science on the Threshold of the 21st Century
  International Conference, St Petersburg (Russian Federation), 17-19 September 1998.
• Industry, Technology, Ecology - ITE '98
  First International Conference, Moscow (Russian Federation), September 1998.
• Climate and Water - A 1998 Perspective
  Second International Conference, Espoo (Finland), 17-20 August 1998
• Nuclear Disarmament, Safe Disposal of Nuclear Materials or New Weapons Developments? Where are the National Laboratories going?
  UNESCO International School of Science for Peace, Villa Erba, Cernobbio-Como (Italy), 2-4 July 1998.
• Engineering Geology and the Environment
  International Symposium of the International Association of Engineering Geology (IAEG), Athens (Greece), 23-27 June 1998.
• Water: a Looming Crisis
  International Conference on World Water Resources at the Beginning of the Twenty-first Century, UNESCO, Paris (France), 3-6 June 1998.
• Sciences et Valeurs
  Réunion internationale, Vérone (Italie), 21-24 mai 1998.
• Opportunities for International Interdisciplinary Research
  Workshop on Theoretical Nuclear/Particle Physics,
  Ames (Iowa - United States), 22-23 May 1998
• Energy Security in the Third Millenium: Scientific and Technological Issues
  UNESCO International School of Science for Peace,
  Villa Olmo, Como (Italy) 14-16 May 1998.
• Sciences et développement
  Colloque des pays francophones, Paris (France), 13-14 mai 1998.
  Science and Development
  Symposium of French-speaking countries, Paris (France), 13-14 May 1998.
• Future Scientists: Women and Men
  International Encounter of Young People, UNESCO,
  Paris (France), 23-24 April 1998.
• Possible Consequences of the Misuse of Biological Sciences
  UNESCO International School of Science for Peace, Villa Olmo (Italy) 3-6 December 1997.
• Role of Scientific Foundations in Support of World Science
  International Seminar, Minsk (Belarus), 3-5 September 1997.
• Basic Sciences for National Development Plans under Changing Economic conditions: a Sub-regional Perspective
  Second Central European Workshop, GozdtMartuljek (Slovenia), 27-28 June 1997.
• Science Funds and Foundations as Essential Elements of the Research and Development Process
  First European Regional Conference, Bled (Slovenia), 20-22 June 1996.
• Basic Sciences for Development : Subregional Opportunities and Challenges
  Central European Workshop, Keszthely (Hungary), 18-20 January 1996.
• Donor Support to Development-Oriented Research in Basic the Sciences
  International Conference, Uppsala (Sweden), 15-16 June 1995.

LATIN AMERICA AND CARIBBEAN

• Reunion Regional de Consulta de América Latina y del Caribe de la Conferencia Mundial Sobre la Ciencia
  Relatoria General / Declaración de Santo Domingo- Reunión Regional -
  Santo Domingo (Republica Dominica), 10 al 12 de marzo 1999.
  Latin America and the Caribbean Regional Consultative Meeting for the World Conference on Science
  Report (in Spanish only) / Declaration of Santo Domingo
  Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic), 10-12 March 1999.
• Mujeres, Ciencia y Tecnología en América Latina: Diagnósticos y Estratégias - Foro Regional, Bariloche (Argentina), 21 al 23 de octubre 1998.
  Femmes, science et technologie en Amérique latine: diagnostic et stratégies
  Colloque regional,
  Bariloche (Argentine), 21-23 octobre 1998
  Women, Science and Technology in Latin America: Diagnoses and Strategies/
  Regional Symposium,
  Bariloche (Argentina), 21-23 October 1998.
• Furthering cooperation in Science and Technology for Caribbean Development
  First Caribbean Conference on Science and Technology,
  Port of Spain (Trinidad and Tobago), 23-25 September 1998.
• Congrès Inter-Latin pour la Pensée Complexe(CILPEC)
  Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), 8-11 septembre 1998.
• La Ciencia en la Integración latino-americana
  Regional Meeting, Cancun (Mexico), March 1998.
• Sixth General Conference of the Third World Academy of Sciences (TWAS)
  Rio de Janeiro (Brasil), 6-11 September 1997.