Statement by the President on the Forthcoming U.N. Conference on the Application of Science and Technology for the Benefit of the Less Developed Areas.

THIS MORNING I have met with Dr. Walsh McDermott, Chairman of the United States Delegation to the United Nations Conference on the Application of Science and Technology for the Benefit of the Less Developed Areas and with the members of his delegation. At this meeting I conveyed two main thoughts to Dr. McDermott and his colleagues.

First, my close personal interest in the success of this conference. It is in line with the resolution establishing a United Nations Decade of Development--proposed by the United States and adopted unanimously by the Sixteenth General Assembly of the United Nations. It is the first major international effort to focus on the very complex problem of how best to adapt and transfer some of the huge inventory of technology accumulated over the years in the industrialized world to the immediate problems of the newly developing countries.

There are no pat solutions to this problem. Our delegation therefore will approach the economic and social problems of growth in the full spirit of scientific inquiry. Yet there is no reason why developing nations have to make the same mistakes made by the nations which industrialized early--no reason why our great body of advanced technology should not be brought to bear so the newly-developing nations can leap-frog interim stages in the process of modernization.

Second, I wanted to express my deep appreciation for the outstanding cooperation and contributions of the private scientific community of the United States in preparing for this conference. At least three hundred scientists, technicians and development experts in private life have taken part in these preparations--by mobilizing scientific talent, by preparing conference papers, and by serving as consultants. Approximately sixty of these leaders from a dozen major fields of activity will go to Geneva, along with some forty representatives of the technical and development agencies of government, as members or advisers to our distinguished delegation. This is a splendid example of public-private collaboration in support of a major goal of our foreign policy. I sincerely hope that this forecasts a progressively deeper involvement, not only of the scientific community but of other elements in our society, in the most constructive task of our age--helping the other two-thirds of the world to provide quickly the material basis of a decent life for all.

I am grateful to all who have contributed generously of their time and talents to this project; and I have asked Dr. McDermott to convey my warm thanks to them.