Our two times delayed Mexican RDI Policy
Again, the following is another writing exercise of topics that I’m starting to have interest in. Within the last three days I have been consulting some information regarding the influence of science in politics and the other way round. This in cooperation with some class mates from a one-term seminar called Politics of Science. It has been very interesting, since it gave me the opportunity to dig in a topic that, personally, I had already taken for dead and without chance for improvement. Now, I changed my mind at least for re-awakening the interest of the current state of the national science.
So I started looking for information related to the current Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) Policy in México. My surprise was that the only information that I found was from the last two presidencial periods, yes PAN and PRI. First comment is that I was expecting a long term plan for science and technology at least for 10 years, not only for presidency periods. This made me think of this as a proof that the CONACYT is not planning for the long term, as it would be expected from the national council; instead it would be changing priorities every presidency. The Council should take seriously and with own perspective a plan beyond the interest of the current presidency — This part was written within the first day , afterwards in this text I provide more information about the real content of the policies in science — . However, I continued searching for information and there was no official communication within the CONACYT’s web page, only a reference to some news that informed the Head of the Council, Mrs Alvarez-Buylla, proposed the creation of a new plan for the period 2019–2024 — why could it not be till 2030? Independently of who is going to be sit on the presidencial chair? — . Today is the 05.06 of 2020, and I hope there is already some results about this special program cause a year is already gone away since the start of the new presidency.
Before continuing with the main topic, let me introduce an interesting index that I found: by 2016 the total amount as a percentage of the GDP that the Mexican government invested in education was 4.9%, which is really surprising, as it represents almost the same amount that countries like US and Germany are investing, namely the 4.8% of their GDP.
Apparently, each presidency term the policy for science and technology is reviewed and changed. These has both advantages and disadvantages, on one hand there is a periodic review of the strategies, as on the other, this could lead to change during each term the priorities of the policy, which should run on the — not real — long term with already defined guidelines. Some questions arose within my head about the procedure of creation of this policies (Programa Especial de Ciencia Tecnlogia e Inovacion XXXX); for instance, how is the participation of the community during the design phase?. The last resource available dated from 2014 and it aims as main goal to “leading Mexico to its maximum potential”, which made me think at first instance, that potential is only the capability to do something, does not mean being doing it. Afterwards, it defines five national goals and three transversal strategies, this means, strategies that are shared among the different goals. I’m not discussing the contents of each goal neither the strategies, since there is plenty information of it in the document itself. It is important though to mention, that the policy indeed includes a long term goal — which gave me a sort of relief — , specifically that by 2030 Mexico should be competitive enough with the most advance countries in terms of research and development. The R&D investment should increase each year to reach as first requirement the 1% of the GDP — this would have required at least five years starting from its implementation, which adds up to be 2019 — . The other strategies are generic but sensible, such as training of high quality human resources, pushing forward the motivation for capabilities and vocation on the scientific field, transferring of knowledge in the sense of education and, finally supporting the strengthening of the infrastructure for science and technology.
Pretty nice presented. But after six years from its publication, the reality, at least in terms of investment, is stuck at 0.5% of the GDP. Meanwhile, the other factors would need a deeper analysis. The following table shows the expected increment of investment corresponding to the different phases of the plan. Something to note is how by 2030, according to the 2012–2018 plan, it was foreseen to have reached the 1.9% of investment from the GDP; while in the previous plan (2008–2012) it was contemplated to have reached or approached the 3.0% by the same year. This could be understandable, since a lot has happen ever since; nonetheless, this brings one to think, the coming new policy may include new and lower numbers to catch up with this delay. Maybe only 1.5% by 2030 if the government plays the conservative.
Nowadays, it’s also worth to mention that there has been a tendency of some national indicators, that would lead to conclude that not all aspects of science are stuck, at least some of them have seen a slow increment in their numbers; for instance, the number of publications.
Concerning the different phases of the plan, it is also worth to point out that the compromise for private entities to support R&D was foreseen to act mostly within the third phase —Consolidation of competitiveness — . Seeing around us the current situation, during an ever growing pandemic and social protests around the world, it might be sensible to think in more cooperation from the private sector and the government, always acting on the transparency’s side, of course. We might have already passed the first stage and being over delayed in the second, but why don’t we consider that the new policy could start with a mixture of the first and the third phase? This would translate into a better coordination of the activities that eventually would lead to the take-off phase; and even though, the numbers in investment would be still to be caught up, other strategies can be leveraged, namely the strengthening of the infrastructure for science and technology — from the mentioned guidelines mentioned in the first part — .
However, it is clear that there are so many factors that influence the expected outcome of a new policy after being executed — if ever — . But I defend that the exercise of starting to dig into this kind of debates, even though, we’re not completely part of the scientific community, can make people aware of the importance of education, which endorses eventually the scientific development.
As a conclusion, I would like to express my disappointment instead of my non-existent surprise, about a fact that I came to know in a very interesting document that was published around May 2019. The author institution is called “Foro Consultivo Científico y Tecnológico, AC”. This special forum receives the requests from the CONACYT to start a process of consultation, such that the guidelines for new policies can be developed. This forum publishes as well the results after the call for support to the scientific community. My disappointment does not lay on the forum itself neither the documentation, but on what it presents as a summary. I invite kindly to have a look into it and see how is the overall participation of the most prestige group of scientist in Mexico, the SNI. It turns out that the top scientist (SNI level 3) were those who participated the least within the official survey organized by the aforementioned forum, this as part of the activities to design the Policy for 2019–2024. As I said before, it is shaming but not surprise that the participation at those levels is so low, while the younger ones (assumed to be mainly SNI 1 and candidates) added up more than 75% of the participation. This by no means can be translated in a total success of the new paths for democratize the Policy, since the overall participation was only about 20% of the total of researchers that are registered in the SNI directory.
As an extra comment, it would be very interesting to read about better years of the SNI group. I don´t want to keep the idea that these “loable” have been never politically active. In this regard, I found a rather small but interesting collection of online books in the Academia Mexicana de Ciencias´s web page. Unfortunately all the links are dead. One of them seemed to be interesting enough, since it addressed the importance and results of the SNI group after 20 years from its creation. Let us wait until they answer the notification mail that I sent.
Following up the point about the consulting, It’s very clear that with this participation it’s laughable when some SNI3 researchers react on the social media to political measures that are considered against the national scientific community. Sadly, to ground this comment, I should have information for the personalities themselves — anyway, by using this medium I will assume those were not enough active the last 20 years — . How would they be heard if they only react at the precise moment when something gets viral, whereas remain silent as its own scientific institution calls for their participation?
There is only one way to demand respect from the authorities and it is speaking up their minds. If the institution — CONACYT — is the one that does not work, then to demand a renovation would not be a thought out of sense.
Programa Especial de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación 2014–2018:
Aportaciones de la comunidad al Plan Nacional de Desarrollo y al diseño del Programa Especial de CTI:
https://www.foroconsultivo.org.mx/FCCyT/documentos/Aportaciones_PND-PECITI.pdf
Programa Especial de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación 2008–2012:
https://www.conacyt.gob.mx/cibiogem/index.php/programa-especial-de-ciencia-y-tecnologia-e-innovacion-2008-2012
