Ireland urged to increase research spending

Science conference:The EU Commissioner for Research, Janez Potocnik, has said Ireland needs to spend more on research and development.

Minister for Enterprise and Employment Micheál Martin said the Government's goal was that by 2013 Ireland would be internationally renowned for the excellence of its research.

Mr Martin told a summit of more than 400 leading Irish and international scientists that Ireland's economic future depended on exploiting ideas and the creativity of talented researchers.

Mr Potocnik urged the Government to keep up spending on R&D in order to reach EU targets.

Currently, spending on R&D in Ireland is over 1.3 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), compared to an EU average of 1.8 per cent.

The EU wants member states to increase their spending in the area to 3 per cent by 2010.

"Ireland is making progress in narrowing the gap on R&D spending. I can only urge you to sustain - and where possible - increase the pace. The rest of the EU will look to you even more as an example."

However, Mr Martin said €8.2 billion had been committed in the National Development Plan and the Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation to leading edge research and development. This represented a three-fold increase in the amount available under the last national development plan.

Mr Martin said "a partnership approach" was required with higher education institutions, working with industry.

He added: "Scientists face new challenges, the need to be more politically aware of the future impact of their research and to be commercially and socially aware of the road from science to economic growth and from science to job creation."

The two-day summit organised by Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) is the first time the leaders of research groups throughout the State have been brought together to share their findings across a range of disciplines.

"We're aiming to make researchers more central to the economic strategy of the country. There's also a growing emphasis on bringing scientists from different disciplines together, as convergence gives rise to new ideas," said Prof Frank Gannon, director general of the foundation.

Prof Werner Arber from Switzerland, a Nobel prizewinner for medicine/physiology, said Ireland had laid good plans for developing research but there was no guarantee these would be achieved in the next decade.

Prof Arber, whose work laid the foundations for the biotechnology industry, told the conference that all new research should be subjected to technological and policy assessment.

Work that was considered beneficial to mankind could be viewed differently later on; for example, the world had welcomed mass transport and the widespread use of energy but these technologies were undermining the stability of the planet by contributing to global warming, he said.

Prof Gannon said women were well represented in universities and up to PhD level, but they tended to "melt" thereafter as the demands of family grew.