Global Research Council (GRC) Closes Its Inaugural Meeting. (May 16, 2012)

One of the priority areas for Subra Suresh when he took over the directorship of the US National Science Foundation (NSF) was to increase the collaboration between the nation's scientists and those of other nations. However, the bureaucracy involved in arranging international agreements was driving him up the wall. Not only were matters of reaching agreement on intellectual property difficult, agreeing on common standards for peer review could be onerous when assessing bilateral or multilateral grant applications: "We keep repeating the same thing over and over," Dr Suresh told ScienceInsider's Jeffrey Mervis about the discussions over how each side would select the most worthy proposals. "Having to start from scratch causes considerable delay, and it is a big waste of time."

Responding to his frustration, the NSF director proposed a meeting of 47 leaders of research funding agencies from 44 countries to form the Global Research Council*, and Dr Suresh told ScienceInsider he wasn't interested in simply creating another opportunity for senior policymakers to satisfy their yen for travel or one more forum at which they can complain about the perilous state of research funding. "We want something tangible to come out at each meeting, and it's a virtual organization—there's no secretariat and no bureaucracy. People will come at their own expense. And if it doesn't address a real need, there's no reason for the council to exist."

The result of a year's effort by the group prior to its first meeting at NSF headquarters over the past two days is the Global Summit on Merit Review which is reprinted below.

"These are not necessarily all-inclusive principles," Suresh said at a press conference at the end of the conference, "but they are basic principles we all agreed on," and which the participants hope will help smooth the way for multinational research projects.

Having detailed the proposed merit review system the GRC is now to "focus on developing common views on safeguarding research integrity and expanding open access, said science chiefs from Brazil and Germany, who will lead the effort. Both are 'important' topics 'in every laboratory in the world,' said physicist Glaucius Oliva, president of Brazil's National Council for Scientific and Technological Development, the nation's lead research funding agency", Mr Mervis reported.

The GRC intends to proclaim the group's consensus on the two issues at the summit meeting next May in Berlin.

Dr Suresh speaking for the GRC said the council also wants to ensure that "there is no disconnect between established institutions and those that are just getting started," while Germany's Matthias Kleiner said GRC will provide a forum for discussing how nations can balance "cooperation and competition" in science as well as considering how their funding practices contribute to both national goals and global needs.

Apart from the annual summit meetings the council intends to hold regional meetings during the next twelve months on the two new topics -- safeguarding research integrity and expanding open access.

__________________________________________

_______________________________________________

*Click here for a full listing of the nations' participants.