What Impact has the Foresight Project had on Biomedical Research in New Zealand-

• Introduction
• Foresight Values
• The Government’s Four Strategic Goals for the Science Envelope
• Foresight Project Sets 14 Target Outcomes
• Purchasing Agencies Form Research Portfolios
• Foundation of Research, Science and Technology and the Health Research Council of New Zealand
• The Marsden Fund and the New Economy Research Fund
• Implications for Biomedical Research in the New Purchase Environment
• Is the Foresight Process Being Funded to a Level that Will Allow It to Work?
• Positive Outcomes of the Foresight Project
• Conclusion
• References

Introduction

In 1998 the Government directed the Ministry of Research, Science and Technology (MORST) to initiate the Foresight Project, which aimed to establish a process whereby funders, users and providers of research would be brought together to map out the future direction of research, science and technology (RS&T) in New Zealand. There appears to have been a political consensus regarding the suitability of Foresight as a strategic process.  ¹   Apparently New Zealand was ready for some clear strategic direction in this area.

The process of establishing Foresight has been viewed in several ways by those involved in the health research sector. Some have seen it as merely another exercise in government bureaucratic deck chair shuffling; for others there appear to be opportunities for new types of cross-sector research and collaboration. Some have seen it as an opportunity to win funding from government and private sector sources, whilst yet others have seen it as an attempt by government to reduce its responsibilities to the research sector in New Zealand. This paper examines Foresight’s Target Outcomes and their values and implementation through the myriad of government agencies from the personal perspective of a small biomedical research provider. It then examines the potential impacts on biomedical research of the Foresight Outcomes. Because of the recent change in government, the term "Government" in this paper refers to the previous, National-led government.

 

 

Foresight Values

The Foresight Project asked for submissions and comments from various government funders of research, the end users of research and those conducting the research (the providers). This process was intended to provide a comprehensive picture of the needs and wants (strategic goals) of the RS&T sector in New Zealand. These submissions were guided by the discussion literature, which introduced concepts like "smart purchasing" and "research portfolios".  ²   "Smart purchasing" is defined as a system of purchasing involving discussion between users and providers of research as a means of setting priorities within a portfolio of research to be purchased. The guiding rationale behind the smart purchasing approach is a belief that "interaction between providers and users enables innovation to lead to desirable outcomes for the community".  ³   Another anticipated outcome of smart purchasing is that a mechanism is established that will facilitate more direct funding of research by users. Discussion documents intending to provide information about the process were used to promote these concepts and establish predetermined focus.

 

 

The Government’s Four Strategic Goals for the Science Envelope  ⁴  

The Government has identified four strategic goals for the science envelope: innovation, economic, environmental and social goals:

• The innovation goal, which aims to foster a culture of innovation in New Zealand by improving the country’s knowledge-base and technological capabilities, including the creation of knowledge, training of individuals and establishment of networks and knowledge dissemination systems.
• The economic goal, which recognises that technology makes businesses competitive, with a focus on research that will lead to new and improved products, processes, systems and services.
• The environmental goal, which acknowledges the importance of the environment for social and economic well-being and focusses on understanding the complex factors that contribute to the physical environment, its sustainable management and the reduction of hazards within it.
• The social goal, which focusses on research that will contribute to a greater understanding of social, biological, environmental, cultural, economic and physical determinants of well-being, including health.

These goals are the start of the implementation chain and, as is expected of the general value- and direction-setting goals for a diverse range of government-funded activities, they are relatively open-ended.

One common thread through all four Goals is that there would be a direct or indirect economic advantage gained through RS&T investment. The other values these Goals promote can apply to most areas of government policy, not just RS&T.

A major concern of note is that health research is buried within broad social goals, even though it can be argued that the improved health status of a population would contribute to all four Goals. There is no mention either of the research activities needed to achieve each goal. Having said this the first two Goals talk about development through knowledge, while the second two talk about increasing knowledge. Perhaps, this can be seen as an applied versus basic research division?

 

 

Foresight Project Sets 14 Target Outcomes

One of the outputs of the Foresight Project is a list of 14 Target Outcomes  ⁵   for the RS&T sector and for government investment in RS&T.

• Wealth from new knowledge-based enterprises
• Innovative manufacturing and service enterprises
• Sustainable use of natural resources
• Wealth-creating food and fibre industries
• Future-focussed global intelligence
• Infrastructure for a knowledge society
• People with knowledge, skills and ideas
• Strong families and communities
• Maori development
• Vibrant culture and identity
• Health for all
• People living in safe and healthy environments
• Healthy, diverse and resilient ecosystems
• New Zealand in the global biophysical environment

The outcomes are also the second link in the chain of the implementation of the Government’s Goals.

The language used within these outcomes reflects the language used in the strategic Goals. Terms such as "knowledge-based", "culture" and "environment" are important concepts used in both sets of goals. This demonstrates a downward flow of the expectations and values embodied in the strategic Goals to the target outcomes of the science envelope.

These Target Outcomes cover a range of disciplines and expectations. Some are very broad, such as health for all, while some are a lot more specific, focussing on certain industries. Certainly these targets touch on all sectors of RS&T in New Zealand. However, the breadth of the targets could potentially water down the effects of Foresight as purchasing agencies, such as the Foundation of Research, Science and Technology (FRST) and the Health Research Council of New Zealand (HRC), must pick and choose the outcomes relevant to themselves. For example, the HRC will obviously choose "Health for all" as one of its target outcomes, yet deciding which other outcomes should be included in the HRC’s goals is less clear. Public health research can have some input into "People living in safe and healthy environments", yet responsibility for achieving this could equally rest with other non-health related disciplines. Of the 14 Target Outcomes, the HRC could potentially contribute directly to seven: "Wealth from new knowledge", "Future-focussed global intelligence", "Infrastructure for a knowledge-society", "People with knowledge and skills and ideas", "Maori development", "Health for all" and "People living in safe and healthy environments". If it were to concentrate on this many, however, there is a real chance that it would lose its focus and effectiveness. The diversity of interpretation of each Target Outcome has also left biomedical research in a state of confusion as to where the concentration of efforts should be to fit into the new purchasing environment.

 

 

Purchasing Agencies Form Research Portfolios

The third link in the Foresight implementation chain has been carried out by the purchasing agencies in the form of developing research portfolios. The agencies’ task is to develop portfolios in which a range of research activities, from basic research through to targeted research, is purchased to contribute to a particular outcome. At the end of each funding year a strategic analysis of the effectiveness of the portfolios in working towards their target outcomes will be submitted to MORST. These portfolios are still in the developmental stage with each agency taking a different approach to their development. Decisions about the allocation of resources, however, must be governed by 10 explicit expectations as laid down in the Blueprint for Change (1999;18–20). These are:

• Focussing on outcomes
• Supporting future-focussed sectors
• Purchasing balanced portfolios
• Fostering collaboration and integration
• Smart purchasing, relationship contracting and contestability
• Meeting standards of merit
• Paying full costs
• Using strategic analysis as the basis for government’s investment in RS&T
• Responsiveness for Maori
• Optimising global connectedness

 

 

Foundation of Research, Science and Technology and the Health Research Council of New Zealand

The two biggest governmental purchase agencies are the FRST and the HRC. These two agencies are currently developing their purchase strategies to align with the outcomes of Foresight. FRST is developing strategic portfolio outlines, which involve contacting RS&T sectors to determine in detail what their needs are and where opportunities lie. Providers of research will be consulted at a later stage to give their perspective of the proposed strategic portfolio outlines.  ⁶  

The HRC’s approach to the development of portfolios is that of consultation with both users and providers of research to create a funding balance between new investigator-initiated research and predetermined priority area research.  ⁷   This should provide for a range of research activities in the health sector, including short- and longer-term funding, new and applied areas of investigation and some training of the research workforce.

HRC’s Research Portfolios  8

Biological systems and technologies Communicable diseases Determinants of health Health and independence of population groups Health sector management Injury rehabilitation Maori health Mental health and neurosciences Non-communicable diseases

The HRC’s approach of developing research portfolios which aim to achieve balance between biomedical-, clinical- and public-health-based research puts the HRC in a favourable position to develop a strong health research community. However, the approach taken by FRST, while it may not meet the needs of the research community longer term, seems more likely in the short term to meet the target outcomes of Foresight. This will be through measurable impacts on key indicators which applied research types are likely to have due to the time frames and obvious benefits involved when research has made it through to the applied stage. Politically and economically this could put the public good science fund in a strong position to win increased funding from both government and industry sources. If this is at the expense of the HRC receiving comparable increases in funding, longer-term knowledge creation and health and economic benefits will have been lost.

Perhaps more important than the issue of funding levels is that of maintaining a thorough peer-reviewed process for selecting research projects to be purchased. At this stage the HRC has made it clear that they see keeping their peer-review process as critical to good purchasing of research. However there is a concern that if research portfolios become highly specified and reaching the target outcomes becomes the only focus, the peer-review process may be compromised to find research that fits into the predetermined boxes. Poorly designed research will fail to impact on the target outcomes just as research with poor resources will.

 

 

The Marsden Fund and the New Economy Research Fund

The Marsden Fund, administered by the Royal Society of New Zealand, is untargeted money for funding excellent, basic research in New Zealand. How will this fund survive in the post-Foresight environment of goal-directed research funding? "The Marsden Fund Committee operated by RSNZ will continue to fund the basic, untargeted research specified in its terms of reference."  ⁹   We can assume, from this statement, that there will be no governmental pressure on the Marsden Fund to pursue the Target Outcomes of the Foresight Project, as this would undermine its job of funding untargeted, excellent, basic research. However, the Blueprint for Change document does state that the Marsden Fund Committee is being asked to provide an analysis of how its investments have, and will, contribute to the Foresight Target Outcomes.  ¹⁰   Does the Marsden Fund have to justify its existence in terms of movement towards target outcomes? It seems not at this stage, however if over time significant impacts on the target outcomes have not eventuated from research funded through the Marsden fund, this information could be used to justify reduced funding. To meet the values contained within the Government’s Goals, both untargeted and targeted research must be well resourced.

We have yet to see how well the New Economy Research Fund (NERF) will function. NERF is also designed to support basic research and is being administered by FRST. NERF may be one reason why FRST’s strategic portfolio outlines are centred more towards applied research over basic research. The risks to NERF are similar to those faced by the Marsden Fund; its nature of funding basic research makes it harder to make progress towards the target outcomes.

 

 

Implications for Biomedical Research in the New Purchase Environment

A major concern for providers of biomedical research is that a very high percentage of research in this area is done at a basic level. With basic research it is difficult to see exactly who the end users are. Are the users the hospitals, the doctors, pharmaceutical companies or the public? How well does basic biomedical research fit into the smart purchasing strategy and how will target outcomes be realised in measurable terms?

Basic research is the foundation of new knowledge that can be applied to produce economic, health or technological benefit. Although this is recognised in the Foresight literature, there is a concern for biomedical researchers that when the purchase agencies identify research that has made measurable steps towards the Target Outcomes, basic biomedical research will be less well represented and so less attractive to purchasers than some more applied forms. One way in which biomedical researchers may combat this problem is through aligning their research with Foresight priority areas. However, this would be to the detriment of new knowledge creation in New Zealand.

This problem was acknowledged in the recent Australian Health and Medical Research Strategic Review, The Virtuous Cycle.  ¹¹  

This diagram illustrates that different research disciplines require different types of research activities. Biomedical research is largely dominated by untargeted, fundamental or basic research. Only a small percentage of biomedical research ever makes it to the applied or developmental stage of research. At the opposite end of the spectrum is health services research that is primarily conducted using more applied forms of research. Public Health in this diagram is quite evenly split between basic and applied research. There must be recognition that the different research disciplines should still retain their individual cultures and needs in a portfolio environment and that this is, in fact, vital for the conduct of good research.

 

 

Is the Foresight Process Being Funded to a Level that Will Allow It to Work?

Another interesting point raised in The Virtuous Cycle is that, with a government investment well below the OECD average as a percentage of GDP, Australia was having trouble holding its ground internationally in the health research community. The Australian Government’s response to the recommendations made in this Australian review was to effectively double their investment in health research.

New Zealand’s RS&T investment at 0.61 percent of GDP is also well below the OECD average of 0.76.  ¹²   However, the government has yet to increase funding as an outcome of the Foresight Project. As mentioned earlier, smart purchasing can be looked at as a mechanism for increasing funding from the users of research, especially the commercial sector. This is a valid outcome as the percentage of GDP that New Zealand business spends on RS&T is relatively low compared with the OECD average. However, only the government is equipped to play a leading role in supporting basic biomedical research in the long-term, as it is difficult to find any business in New Zealand that fund research with long term goals and rewards. Basic biomedical research is the government’s responsibility on behalf on the community because this type of research is, in essence, for the public good.

 

 

Positive Outcomes of the Foresight Project

While there are potential pitfalls in the changes arising from the Foresight Project, there are also some positive opportunities. One of the major advances for research in New Zealand has been the government’s explicit expectations for purchasing agents, as laid down in the Blueprint for Change, to fully fund research projects. This means that administrative overheads involved with conducting research should be directly linked to the research being purchased.

There are two reasons why this is a positive move. Firstly, research would be better organised and appropriately supported through a transparent purchasing system. Secondly, the researchers and the organisations supporting the research are given the means to more appropriately organise and group their research activities for the community’s benefit. This, combined with the communication links between funders, users and different providers embodied in smart purchasing, has made collaborative research efforts more attractive and, consequently, exciting new research possibilities are being realised.

Against this positive, however, must be set the recent restrictive regulatory changes involving the Environmental Risk Management Authority (ERMA) and the Ministry of Agriculture (MAF). These bodies have instituted new standards and initiated new regulations that have improved the standard of controlling what comes into the country and how it is handled. While these changes fulfil public demand for greater control over scientific endeavours, the cost of compliance is high. A lot of researcher and support staff time and monetary resources are now being tied up in the process of applying to ERMA for approval to import a new organism or hazardous substance, and to meet the MAF requirements to house these restricted items. The responsibility for these costs rests with the researcher and is an added drain impacting directly on already stretched research budgets that is offset against any increased research funding. It seems somewhat surprising, then, that with governmental commitment to full-cost funding that there has been little real commitment to increase funding levels.

 

 

Conclusion

The Foresight Project was instigated to allow New Zealand to determine the future direction of research and science in this country. Some of the ideas coming out of Foresight are constructive and provide a foundation on which to build. Some good collaboration programmes have already been set up, which have been helped by the emphasis Foresight has put on science issues and the consultation processes used which have grouped researchers together. A review of tertiary education, which would explore making access to higher education easier, must be the next step. If such a review was done well and resulted in an increase in high quality postgraduate research, this would significantly contribute to at least three of Foresight’s Target Outcomes. To achieve most of the other Outcomes in a moderate time frame requires a substantial investment from government and various sectors of society. It will be important that the new Labour–Alliance Government commits to these directions. Making these outcomes a reality will involve an immediate commitment to lift funding in the long-term, and the time to let the research community work with the changes in procedure and mind set, without further institutional disruption.

From the perspective of a biomedical research institute, has the Foresight Project simply been a bureaucratic exercise, a chance to form new cross-boundaries research, an opportunity to increase funding, or a process of shifting responsibility for RS&T? The actual benefits and problems are not clear at this stage, although with such a big project the outputs and outcomes are likely to consist of a combination of all the above options. We will have a better idea when the HRC research portfolios have been finalised and the results of the first grant rounds using them have been completed in 2001. The extent of the new Government’s commitment to science and education is another important factor. There are real dangers before us and some exciting new possibilities, whether either eventuate will be determined by the commitment of government, business and society to the belief that knowledge and scientific research is essential for progress and maintaining the international competitiveness of our industries.

 

 

References

• NZ Science Review. Special issue for the 1999 election, 1999:56(3), p49
• Ministry of Research, Science and Technology. Setting criteria for government investment. Wellington: The Foresight Project; 1998
• Ministry of Research, Science and Technology. Setting criteria for government investment. Wellington:The Foresight Project; 1998; p6
• Minister of Research, Science and Technology. Blueprint for change: government’s policies and procedures for its research, science and technology investments. Wellington;1999
• Ministry of Research, Science and Technology. Blueprint for change: government’s policies and procedures for its research, science and technology investments. Wellington; 1999
• The Foundation of Research, Science and Technology. The Foresight-based investment process. Wellington: 1999
• The Health Research Council of New Zealand. From vision to reality – development of the health sector’s research strategy to implement foresight part 1. Wellington: 1999
• Health Research Council of New Zealand. Transitional purchase strategy 1999/2000. Wellington: 1999
• MORST. Blueprint for change: government’s policies and procedures for its research, science and technology investments. Wellington; 1999. p16
• MORST. Blueprint for change government’s policies and procedures for its research, science and technology investments. Wellington; 1999, p18
• Health and Medical Research Strategic Review. The virtuous cycle – working together for health and medical research. Wellington; 1998
• Ministry of Research, Science and Technology. New Zealand research and development statistics 1997/98. Wellington;1999

 

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