OREANDA-NEWS. September 25, 2014. The Memorandum of Intent with regard to the mutual understanding relating to the cooperation between the State Atomic Energy Corporation ROSATOM and NAC Kazatomprom in the area of nuclear energy promotion was signed in Vienna at the margins of 58th Session of the IAEA General Conference.

The document was executed by the General Director of Rosatom State Corporation Sergey Kirienko and the Chairman of the Management Board of NAC Kazatomprom Nurlan Kapparov.

Russian and Kazakh companies decided to join their efforts in the area of promoting nuclear energy and up-to-date nuclear technologies in the Republic of Kazakhstan. The parties intent to develop educational and tutorial materials, implement joint programs designed to encourage younger generation to receive college and university education for professions demanded in the area of nuclear energy and industry.

An important point of the Memorandum is the agreement relating to the creation of information center on nuclear energy on the area of School Students’ Hall in Astana city. The center, which Rosatom is planning to open next year will become 23rd in the network of information centers and the 6th center opened abroad. Astana information center shall have the following main objectives: educating the population in the area of nuclear energy implementation, promoting Russian nuclear technologies and technical education, promoting natural sciences. The information center’s target audience are school students, university students, teachers, representatives of government authorities, public and environmental organizations, representatives of mass media.

Information centers on nuclear energy are the unique communication platforms for the wide range of visitors. Their main objectives are educating the public in the area of nuclear energy, promoting science and innovations. Today information centers effectively operate in 17 Russian regions and also in Vietnam, Turkey and Bangladesh. The information center in Minsk (Belarus) shall be opened by the end of 2014. The effectiveness of information centers’ operation is supported by the independent social research. Over 55% of visitors have changed their attitude towards nuclear energy after visiting the center. 77,5% of school students would like to visit the center again. In 2010 the project of information centers received PIME Award for Communications Excellence as the best communication project of Europe in the nuclear field (the organizers of the award are IAEA, Nuclear Energy Agency and the European Atomic Forum (FORATOM).