Greetings

Welcome letter from the President of Asian Federation of Biotechnology

Dear friends and colleagues,

I am honored to welcome you to the 2021 AFOB Virtual Conference from 11/01/2021 – 11/04/2021. The Asian Federation of Biotechnology (AFOB) planned on holding the biennial Asian Congress on Biotechnology (ACB) in 2021, however, has been postponed to September 2022 due to the pandemic. ACB will still be held in Bali, Indonesia. For this year, we will be holding the virtual conference to show our promise to you that we will overcome difficulties and continue to hold and exchange academic activities with high standards.

Scientific Divisions of AFOB shoulder the mission of promoting the development of applied biotechnology in different fields. These Divisions have played important roles in the recent ACB events with cooperation of European Federation of Biotechnology (EFB). Therefore, this year’s virtual conference will be conducted in the form of research exchanges among various scientific Divisions. As the world is facing a new wave of COVID-19 triggered by the highly contagious Delta variant, the AFOB grows more concern for this pandemic. A special session about COVID-19 will be included in this conference. Our hope is to be a part of improving scientific research and technological development in overcoming the COVID-19 pandemic.

Our last major AFOB conference was ACB 2019 in Taipei. After that, the 12th AFOB Regional Symposium (ARS 2020) was held in February 2020 in Yogyakarta, Indonesia before the outbreak of the pandemic. After the pandemic hit, all physical meetings of AFOB have been cancelled or postponed except for some webinars and online activities. We are hoping that this AFOB Virtual Conference will provide an occasion for research exchange in various scientific fields and continue to promote the development of applied biotechnology.

The 2021 AFOB Virtual conference is the first comprehensive symposium held in this form. For us to achieve remarkable success, we need your full support and participation. Our hope is that this event can facilitate international cooperation even during the pandemic in addition to exchanging and sharing research results and information.

Best regards,



회장
Wen-Chien Lee
President of Asian Federation of Biotechnology