A training program on health care for counties in southeast and south Asia kicked off at National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), Tainan, Taiwan, on August 24 with more than 60 representatives from southeast and south Asia and Taiwan universities. The joint-research and training program includes two workshops, one is on future health care and economic development in Southeast Asia and the other is on sustainable protection and restoration of soil and groundwater. NCKU President Huey-Jen Jenny Su extended her warm welcome to all the guests at the opening ceremony taking place at NCKU Library at 9:00 a.m., on August 24. Su said, this is the first time we have joint opening of seemingly different two specialties, one is medical device and the other is looking at sustainable environment in general. But if you look at the challenging issues of human society, these two particular domains are in a way interact together. She also said, at least two particular areas NCKU has taken our pride to think them as our crown jewel, one is definitely rooted in our historical strength and that is the area of engineering. On the other hand, over the past 30 to 40 years, we have also grown to be recognized as one of the most critical innovative center to challenge the progress and development of joint disciplines as well as engineering, she added. We have the only national center of medical devises and through the years with different areas they have individually and jointly identified ourselves as leaders not only in our country but over the regions. Director-General Shaw-Jeng Tsai from the Department of Life Sciences in the Ministry of Science and Technology said in his opening remark, "We have to develop more advanced, more convenient and more affordable health care systems." The training program to explore the heath care providers is very important, according to Tsai. The purpose of this training program is to strengthen the academic and administrational collaboration between Taiwan and countries in southeast and south Asia, according to NCKU Vice President for International Affairs Yueh-Min Huang who is also the Executive Secretary of Presidents' Forum of Southeast and South Asia and Taiwan Universities (SATU Presidents' Forum) International Secretariat. Banchong Mahaisavariya, vice president of Mahidol University, said, in Thailand we have so many ideas but cannot be achieved because we don't have enough resources and factories. He said, this conference will be fruitful since we have time to engage conversation and join the collaboration because we cannot succeed by isolation. If we learn something different, something new from other countries, we can bring the knowledge to improve our medical care and there will be more effective medical devises in Thailand, according to Mahaisavariya. Kwartarini Murdiastuti, vice dean of Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia, said, we need to know the development of medical devises in Asia because we're going to establish a building for medical device research. A total of more than 60 representatives from 11 counties including Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, India, Korea, Cambodia, Bangladesh, America, and Taiwan, participating in the 8-day training program, from August 24-31.