Science Media Centre

The Government has released this year’s Budget, with $250 million earmarked for science and innovation initiatives. This page will be updated with any new announcements and expert reaction. Finance Minister Steven Joyce delivered his first budget today: the National-led Government’s ninth budget. The Science and Innovation sector will receive $255.6 million of investments over the […]

Australia’s Federal Government has delivered the latest federal budget, which includes funding top-ups and cuts to various scientific programmes. A summary of the impact on science, compiled by the Australian Academy of Science, can be viewed below – along with expert reaction collected by our colleagues at the Australian Science Media Centre on how the budget […]

The national Budget announced today contained a raft of announcements on research, science and innovation funding. Notable changes include: $56.8m more for contestable science funding (over three years, beginning in 2015/16) Plans to reform the contestable funding system, including a new National Statement of Science Investment, aiming to make the system “more flexible, less complex and more closely focused on […]

The much anticipated ‘Powering Innovation’ report, released this week, sets out a number of recommendations to improve New Zealand’s high-value manufacturing sector. The report – and the governments support of it – has been the cause of much excitement in the business community. Among the reports recommendations, the most notable was the call to restructure […]

UPDATED: Bill English unveiled the Budget for 2011-12 this afternoon with no new funding for science, but a reprioritisation of funding in some areas. Overall, core science and innovation remains relatively flat at $773.7 million (down $13.9 million year on year) for the next financial year. A spokesperson for science and innovation minister Dr Wayne […]

On Thursday the government will announce their 2011 budget for New Zealand. The New Zealand Herald‘s Hamish Fletcher caught up with some of the R&D sector’s major players to get an idea of what the budget might hold for Kiwi high-tech research. An excerpt (read in full here): Budget 2011: Little hope of R&D increase […]

The Australian government has announced the 2011 federal budget, revealing that several proposed cuts to science and research funding have not be undertaken. Our colleagues at the AusSMC have contacted experts for comment on the financial situation presented by the budget, available below. Further comments on the 2011 Budget can be found at The Conversation. […]

An editorial in the Otago Daily Times discusses why, in terms of last week’s budget announcement for research, science and technology funding, a few crumbs is better than none, and that the renewed focus on science and research is reassuring. However, it says the commitment is a limited one for a limited period, and government […]

In an opinion piece in the Dominion Post, Colin James wonders whether Prime Minister’s funding for Research, Science and Technology (RS&T) is quite as incendiary as claimed. Having had a look at the amount of money Government will be spending on new initiatives, James suggests that the proportion being spent on RS&T isn’t big enough, […]

Rosa Studholme writes in the Oamaru Mail about a local scientist who feels Prime Minister John Key’s research, science and technology budget should have had a larger proportion of funding going directly to scientists, not business. He says that many of the country’s scientists are operating on a shoe string, and could boost the technology […]