Netherlands' New Research Minister, Molecular Geneticist Ronald Plasterk, Speaks to Nature. (March 1, 2007)

    Last week TFW reported that the newly installed Netherlands government had nominated Ronald Plasterk to be Minister of Science, Education and Culture.

For this week's issue of the journal Nature Professor Plasterk made a couple of critical points that are just as pertinent to research in Australia and they are to Holland's.

Ronald Plasterk

Nature: What are the key issues for science in the Netherlands?

Europe is losing ground — compared with the United States, for example, from which we have a lot to learn in terms of meritocracy and researcher mobility. Holland is not so bad

actually, but it could be, and needs to be, better. The academic system must become less hierarchical. The number of women in top science jobs is embarrassingly low, among the worst in Europe.

Nature: How can scientific quality be improved?

Ask yourself why so many top physicists, including three Nobel prizewinners, ended up in Leiden 100 years ago? Or at the Cavendish laboratories in Cambridge? There is no blueprint for quality — top scientists will go where they can work best. We just need to provide sufficient funding to allow centres of excellence to emerge from within the community. And there is in fact more money for research foreseen in the government plan.