NWO's activities in 2005 in a nutshell
NWO’s mission is to stimulate quality and innovation in Dutch science. Fulfillment of this mission was, as in the years before, based on her strategy Themes plus Talent. The year 2005 was a transitional year as well, leading to the new strategy Science Valued!; in close consultation with her partners in the domain of knowledge, NWO has reflected in 2005 on its role, possibilities and ambitions for 2007-2010.
NWO’s mission is stated in the NWO law; the strategy that formed the basis for NWO’s activities in 2005 is formulated in the strategic paper Themes with Talent. The key targets of Themes plus Talent are:
- Themes
- Talent
- Internationalisation
- Infrastructure
- Communication and knowledge dissemination
The 2005 results on these key targets are reported in the formal Annual Report 2005, by means of NWO’s official accountability indicators and financial report. The Annual Report gives an overview of the progression of NWO’s policy on science.
In short:
Talent
NWO invests in the intellectual capital of young scientific talent in order to secure a future leading position in science for the Netherlands. To achieve this goal NWO uses instruments such as:
- the NWO/Spinoza prize
- the Innovational Research Incentives Scheme
- the Talent programme (replaced in 2005 by Rubicon)
- the Casimir programme
- the Aspasia programma, for stimulating women in science
- the Mozaic programma, for stimulating ethnic minorities in science
- within the various NWO divisions, subsidy schemes aiming at individual researchers and relating to their specific area of expertise.
This talent policy in which the Innovational Research Incentives Scheme plays a central role, is very succesful. Young researchers are stimulated to give a essential push to their career, and a lot of laureates of the Innovational Research Incentives Scheme received tenure positions at universities as associate professor or professor.
Themes
NWO is being confronted by society’s issues of ever increasing complexity. Therefore, it initiates multidisciplinary research. Nine themes epitomise that approach: Shifts in Governance, Cognition and Behaviour, Cultural Heritage, Digitalisation and Information Technology, Ethical and Social Aspects of Research and Innovation, Fundamentals of Life Processes, Nano-sciences, Emerging Technologies, and System Earth.
Within the framework of these themes in 2005 93 research programmes were in progress and NWO invested more than 76 million euros.
Internationalisation
NWO is convinced that international cooperation and competition contribute to the quality and innovative character of research. The problems facing the Netherlands are global issues. NWO therefore is actively involved in international developments, among other things by
- participating in the ERA-nets, Technology Platforms and EURYI
- participating in the EuroHORCs and EURYI
- cooperating with countries outside Europe
- NWO-subsidy-instruments for stimulating international exchange and cooperation
In this approach NWO cooperates with a lot of science organisations especially in Europe, to create focus and critical mass necessary to be able to compete with the United States and the emerging economies.
Infrastructure
An efficient infrastructure is a vital factor in creating a challenging and exciting research environment. NWO contributes both nationally and internationally in various ways to strengthening the research infrastructure. This includes:
- the investment programmes NWO Large and NWO Medium
- financing computing time, measuring time and cruising time at national and international research facilities
- coordinating and sponsoring the national high-end computer infrastructure via NCF
- investments in infrastructure via the NWO institutes
In 2005 the NWO-institutes ASTRON, CWI, ING, NIOZ, NSCR en SRON were evaluated by international committees; they all received the predicate “very good” to “excellent”. Above that, NWO’s investment programmes were extended by the National Programme for Investments in Large-scale Research Facilities, initiated by the Dutch National Innovation Platform. Thanks to these large investments in infrastructure the Netherlands will be able to reinforce their position as attractive science country.
Communication and knowledge dissemination
NWO puts great store by a self-conscious and transparent accountability, good communications with the various fields, a well-organised presentation of subsidies, and an up-to-date overview of the results of NWO-financed research. These objectives are reached by
- policy communication and Public Affairs
- subsidy communication
- stimulating and facilitating scientific discourse
- knowledge transfer and communicating science to the press and general public
Central in 2005 was the process leading to NWO’s new strategy 2007-2010. During a series of meetings and interviews and questionnaires NWO collected opinions from her partners in science and society and exchanged ideas about NWO’ s direction and role in science in 2007-2010. This exchange of ideas proved indispensable in developing the strategy Science Valued!
On top of that the activities of NWO on knowledge transfer and science communication attracted a wide audience. Science was very much present in Dutch society, with over 1900 articles in Dutch general media about NWO financed research.
Efficiency and transparancy
NWO makes every effort to do her work for science and society as effective, efficient and transparent as possible. This means that NWO permanently pays attention to the possibilities to approve its selection procedures. In 2005 this was done among other things by stiffer regulations to prevent conflicts of interest. Furthermore software was developed to support the process of referees commenting on research proposals.
Investments and outcomes
What did NWO invest in science in 2005? And what did it lead to? In 2005 NWO invested 512 million euros. With these funds over 5.000 researchers did their creative, scientific work, resulting in almost 16.000 articles, PhD theses, presentations, books and other publications.
