I've never written a Blog before but I guess that all things come to most people at some point in their lives.  My intention is that matters of the moment concerning research will be publicly discussed.  Some Blogs may pertain to research challenges and others might focus on matters political insofar as they relate to research.   Most will  be relevant to what we do at the Woodhill Park Research Retreat and your contributions are welcomed.

For today, I want to comment on the announcement that is due to be made at mid-day in  our Aotearoa New Zealand Parliament about inserting a large injection of cash funding into agricultural research.  My question is why only into agricultural research?  What about other forms of research?

Our tertiary infrastructure is cash-strapped and students, one of the principal reasons for the very existence of tertiary institutions in the first place, are massively in debt because they need to borrow to learn.   Debts of more than thirty thousand dollars per student are not uncommon and the cumulative level of debt is in the billions. 

Moreover, opportunities for students to work and learn about  research are limited for a range of reasons:

• There seem to be fewer opportunities for students to be employed as research assistants - partially because it is difficult to align assessments with such work and also because departments don't have access to many schemes which can enable research assistance as a form of apprenticeship;
• Academics assiduously and relentlessly seem to spend large dollops of their time pursuing government funding such as those shown on the Government Electronic Tendering System (GETS).  They do this to try to win money for their academic school and in order to cut costs, student research assistants don't always become budget considerations.  Instead academics do the work solo;
• The imperative for academics to pursue higher degrees so that Performance Based Research Funding (PBRF) scores can be lifted seems to mitigate against research that is not thesis focused and that limits opportunities to employ students as research assistants.

I'm sure there are other factors too but the important thing is to realize is that it appears to me that academia is increasingly concerned with addressing research agendas that are not determined by academics as scholars, but rather, are set by government ministries.  Moreover, departments within ministries don't necessarily seem to know what other departments within the same ministry are setting out to purchase and the same seems even to apply to sections within ministry departments.  Bureaucrats seem to be seeking to buy ad hoc services for short term purposes as cheaply as possible.

Which brings me back to this announcement that is due to be made within the next fifteen minutes or so.  Supposedly, a large amount of funding will be allocated to agricultural research and that is absolutely fine - highly commendable in fact.  A world food shortage is looming and thus it makes sense for a country such as Aotearoa New Zealand to invest in research that will help us to feed the rest of the world in ways that earn money for Kiwis (even though the prices of diary products have risen to such an extent that Kiwis can no longer afford them!).  But it also makes sense to bolster opportunities for Kiwi ingenuity in other domains as well.  That means putting money aside for 'pure' as well as 'applied' research into other domains - technology, the social sciences, IT, creative arts, etc., so that research for the sake of research can occur just a little more than it currently does.  And researchers need to drive agenda setting or at least, should be mightily involved in the process.

After all, tertiary institutes are supposed to do research as a matter of routine, not just in concert with industry and governments as Auckland University Professor, Kenneth Husted notes.  It is a part of their scholarly mandate and whilst the government is to be applauded (I think) for their belated response to calls for more, I'm betting that researchers, commentators and the National Party opposition will cry too little too late. 

I'm bound to say though, that the opposition National Party has yet to move beyond platitudes into the realm of saying what they actually intend to deliver if they are given an opportunity to form a coalition government by a mainly cynical New Zealand public.  At the moment our populace seems to be mainly adept at finding fault in the status quo as opposed to interrogating the veracity of those who would occupy the treasury benches in order to determine if opposition policies exist and whether or not they are any better than those of the incumbents. 

In my view, the government is to be congratulated for having started.  However, I'm afraid that it's a tad like the old joke about what do you call a bus-load of politicians falling off the Otira Gorge? Answer: An exceptionally good beginning. 

But now the Government needs to develop strategies and funding, in real terms, which will tap into other domains including the unrealized potential that Kaupapa Maori research offers.  After all, as an example, within the Rohe that is Waiariki, there are several billions of dollars worth of forestry resources.  As a country, therefore, we need to work realistically in partnership with Tangata Whenua so that all can benefit.  This multicultural country of ours really does have a mandate to operate within a bi-cultural framework but does it have the research directions to do so effectively?

There, I've penned my first Blog - blogger it!