MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazil investment in science, via the ministerial budget reaches ‘an all time high’

“It’s not enough to generate knowledge, it’s important to make such knowledge available for the productive sector” said Minister Raupp.

Brazil's investment in science has reached an all-time high, with the science ministry's budget increasing from 8.6 billion Real (about 3.8 billion dollars) in 2012 to 12.7 billion Real (around 5.6bn) this year, according to science minister Marco Antonio Raupp.

Raupp made the announcement last week at the65th Annual Meeting of the Brazilian Association for the Advancement of Science, in Recife.

During much of the last decade, under President Lula da Silva, the science budget allocated through Brazil's Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation substantially rose.

In 2002, it was 1.3 billion Real (about 575m dollars), near the end of Lula da Silva's mandate, in 2010, it reached 7.5 billion Real (3.3bn). But in 2011, the budget dipped to 7.4 billion (3.3bn dollars).

Ennio Candotti, vice-president of the Brazilian Association for the Advancement of Science, welcomed the announcement of the budget rise. But he warned that the budget presented during the conference included funds that are not directly for scientific research, such as money to offer low-interest loans to encourage industrial innovation.

“This money is important, but, if we look at the money targeted specifically at science, we observe that the figures are not much higher than in 2010,” said Candiotti.

“It is good to see the recuperation of the amount, but it is a pity that the steady increase since 2003 was interrupted.”

Since Lula da Silva's time, and more so recently, the science ministry has been giving priority to innovation in the industrial sector, which will receive half of the entire 2013 budget.

“It is not enough to generate knowledge, it is important to make such knowledge available for the productive sector” Raupp said at the conference.

Luana Bonone, president of the National Association of Postgraduates, says that “the emphasis given by the government to technological innovation makes sense, since Brazil needs to develop its productive sector”.

But she adds that she would like to see more funding of social innovations (innovations geared towards strengthening and extending civil society) and basic science, rather than industry and applied sciences.

Brazil is now responsible for 2.7% of world scientific production and occupies 14th place in the world ranking, according to ministry's figures. About 35,000 scientific papers were published and 14,000 dissertations and theses were defended in the country in 2012.