KUALA LUMPUR: Private higher learning institutions need to enhance their position by improving and empowering its research and development (R&D) field and generate research funds within and outside the country.
National Professors Council (NCC) chairman, Prof Emeritus Tan Sri Dr Zakri Abdul Hamid said the the private institutions must not rely solely on income from tuition fees of students to develop their R&D.
"Private institutions have the capabilities and talent to conduct researches at par with public institutions of higher learning and those overseas.
"They should start going deeper into scholarly research and publications and we hope these private institutions would be more involved," he said after opening the Cross-Border Research Collaboration Seminar, here, today.
Zakri added that private institutions could play an integral role to make Malaysia a premier higher education hub in the region, and at an international level in the future.
He also mentioned that some of the best universities in the world are private universities, citing Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) of the United States.
"These universities generate income through R&D that are conducted by their own academicians.
"The government provides numerous international research grants and cross-border research collaboration in tandem with the Science to Action (S2A) initiative.
"Among others, the Newton-Ungku Omar Fund through the collaboration with the British government and research funds in green technology with the Japan government," Zakri added.
The NCC national special projects for private institutions cluster head Prof Datuk Dr Hassan Said said that these private institutions should not focus only on classroom teaching but also work on their R&D.
"We realise that the funds needed for R&D are high, and we hope that private institutions would take the opportunity for cross-border research," he said.