RI researchers receive grants

JAKARTA: Two senior scholars from the National Institute of Sciences (LIPI) are among six Indonesians who have been granted funds by the Nippon Foundation Fellowship/Asian Public Intellectuals (API) to enable them to conduct studies in neighboring countries.

The LIPI researchers, Mohammad Azzam Manan and Anas Saidi, join Slamet Trisutomo of Hasanuddin University in the South Sulawesi capital of Makassar, as the new Indonesian senior fellows of the foundation.

Dave Lumenta of a non-governmental organization in East Kalimantan, Aprilia Budi Hendridjani of Yogyakarta-based Gadjah Mada University and Tatak Prapti Ujiyati of the private Institute for Economic and Social Research, Education and Information (LP3ES) in Jakarta received grants as junior fellows.

The six have arranged their own schedules for carrying out their studies between June 2002 and May 2003. Each of them received US$70,000.

This is the second year of the API fellowship program in Indonesia. A total of 62 researchers applied for this year's awards.

The Nippon Foundation's director for international relations and special projects, Tatsuya Tanami, said that the organization provided $2 million for 60 researchers from 10 Southeast Asian countries annually. -- JP