The Government must reinstate suspended research spending to protect ourreputation abroad and create employment, according to Dr Edward Walsh.Dick Ahlstrom reports.
The Republic's strong reputation abroad as a good place to conduct research could be damaged if the Government fails to keep to its research spending commitments, according to the chairman of the Irish Council for Science, Technology and Innovation (ICSTI).
According to Dr Edward Walsh, the Government could unravel the progress made so far in building the country's research capacity using a massive €2.54 billion investment from the National Development Plan (NDP).
Dr Walsh outlined his concerns, which relate principally to the capital funding "pause" which has held up money made available via the Programme for Research in Third Level Institutions (PRTLI).
He also expressed caution against any roll-back in the 2000-2006 spending plan, aimed at a rapid build-up of our research capacity and an evolution of our industrial/agricultural economy into a knowledge-based economy.
Dr Walsh's warning carries particular authority, given his long standing experience dealing with science funding as president of the University of Limerick and in more recent years as chair of ICSTI.
He led the Foresight Initiative, which recommended a major increase in State research funding. ICSTI also regularly issues statements as one of the Government's key advisory bodies on science policy.
Last month, it published a statement dealing with "State expenditure priorities for 2004". It argues that there must be an "attractive environment that is stable and supportive of research and scientific and technological endeavour" if we are to grow our research base.
With this in mind it urged that the PRTLI budget be reinstated in 2004, and recommended that the "essential investment" being made by the Science Foundation Ireland funding programme be sustained in line with the NDP. It also called for an enhancement in Enterprise Ireland's applied research funding programme, a scheme that helps commercialise university research.
"The most important point we make is to highlight the need for the Government to maintain its research policy as laid out in the NDP," Walsh says. "The Government should stick with the NDP and deliver on what is a very public commitment to invest. Any faltering on Ireland's part can do major damage," he says.
"It is important that we act on this swiftly. This pause can leave cause for comment at the international level" and could cause "severe damage" to our reputation as a centre for research.
"It threatens the whole context of the international commitment. We want to be able to say to the international community that Ireland is a good and stable place for research and development investment."
ICSTI was fully aware of the Exchequer situation at the moment, he says. Yet the investment represents a way to strengthen the economy and help create jobs. "We made the case very vehemently that a commitment to scientific research was a means to stabilise our economic success and build upon it."
This represents a key reason to invest in research, says Walsh. It was also a core argument made when ICSTI first recommended major increases in the State's research expenditure.
"The discussion [with the Government] was very much along the lines that Ireland took a courageous decision in the 1950s to move from a closed agricultural economy to an open industrialised economy," he says. "What a success it has been. We are now at a similar juncture. It represents a major transition phase in Ireland's development."
In its 2004 recommendations, ICSTI shows how research could help in building up the economy and job creation. It argues that increased company R&D is central to our competitiveness and our ability to create jobs in the future and calls for measures that will promote greater R&D performance in companies based here.
It wants the Government to introduce a 20 per cent tax credit for qualifying R&D expenditure. It also wants enhancements of the existing Business Expansion Scheme and the Seed Capital Scheme, to encourage more research.