PCAST Stresses Need for Strategic Innovation Policy to Strengthen U.S. Research Enterprise

With U.S. private sector R&D activity declining and global competition intensifying in areas of U.S. expertise, it is clear the U.S. must take strategic action to maintain its position as the world leader in R&D and prevent innovation from leaving our shores. Last week, the Department of Energy announced 66 breakthrough energy-related projects would receive a total of $130 million through its OPEN 2012 program. Such federal support of early applied research is one of 17 specific recommendations to the president by the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) in a report released last Friday entitled Transformation and Opportunity: The Future of U.S. Research Enterprise.

PCAST highlights the United States' five key opportunities to preserve its global advantage in innovation:

• The nation has the opportunity to maintain its leading position in R&D investment through a collective partnership between industry, the federal government, universities and other governmental and private entities.
• The federal government has the opportunity to enhance its role as the enduring foundational investor in basic and early applied research in the U.S.
• Federal agencies have the opportunity to grow strategic portfolios with a diverse mix of research, work and awards.
• The government has an opportunity to create additional incentives for industry to invest in research on its own and through partnerships with universities and national laboratories.
• Research universities have the opportunity to bolster their additional roles as hubs of the innovation ecosystem.

The report includes 17 explicit policy recommendations to the president that encourage industry, universities and government entities to best capitalize on these opportunities. Suggestions include reaffirming the president's goal of achieving and sustaining R&D expenditures at three percent of GDP and regulatory reform of policy related to research universities. But, even policy recommendations in the report with bipartisan backing face significant challenges within the current political debate about broader fiscal challenges and party differences.

During the recent presidential election, both parties agreed on the need for visa reform for highly-skilled immigrants, but legislation introduced as the STEM Jobs Act including such reform has not won support by the Senate because of a separate provision that disbands the Diversity Visa Program. Both candidates also voiced support for retroactively extending and making the R&D tax credit permanent, but sequestration negotiations heighten uncertainty about its future.

Read the full report here...