This marks a clear departure from a government plan set last year, which called for an increase in budget for science and technology of more than 50 per cent over the forthcoming five years (see table below). It also shows that the government's recent moves to restructure the nation's ailing finances are taking precedence over the plan.

Table 1 Highlights of 1998 budget requests
Full size table

The Ministry for International Trade and Industry (MITI) has requested an increase of about 5 per cent, while the Science and Technology Agency (STA) asked for only a 1.4 per cent increment. Overall, the increases for the various science-related ministries and agencies are less than half the percentage rises obtained this fiscal year, and, together with the ‘scrap and build’ philosophy advocated by the Ministry of Finance to encourage greater flexibility in spending, they may force ministries and funding agencies to look hard at the quality and efficiency of their research funding programmes.

Among the more visible items in this year's budget request is a proposal by the STA to set up a genome research centre inside the Institute for Physical and Chemical Research (Riken), where the STA has been supporting efforts in automated genome sequencing and genome research since the late 1980s.

The STA expects the centre to fulfil a co-ordinating role in genetic research in Japan. But some researchers are not impressed, pointing out that earlier efforts in automated genome sequencing at Riken have failed and that most of Japan's genome research is concentrated in the universities.

The proposed research centre is part of a coordinated effort to bring together research support schemes in information technology, environmental science, and the life sciences at various ministries. MITI is expected to support innovative software products for protein modelling, while the Ministry for Agriculture, Forestry, and Fishery plans to pursue a second, application-oriented, phase of its rice genome project. The Ministry of Health and Welfare has requested increased funding for research on genetic diseases.

Following the same pattern of joint ministry projects, the Ministry of Health and Welfare and the Environmental Agency will reinforce basic and applied research on the public health impact of dioxins. The government revised maximum exhaust standards for dioxins earlier this year, after reports of high dioxin values around Japan's numerous waste-incineration facilities.

Japanese ministries have used the occasion of the International Climate Conference, to be held in Kyoto in December, to request increases for research on global environmental issues. MITI also wants to reinforce government support for renewable energy, efficient furnaces and clean cars.

Earlier this month, after a proposal by the independent Science Council of Japan, the education ministry announced plans to set up centralized research facilities for environmental research and computer science. But the ministry has kept funding requests for both institutions low-key.

The great losers in this year's budget request are large-scale technology development efforts in nuclear energy and space. Nuclear energy research at both MITI and STA has been cut sharply. Earlier this year, Japan's National Space Development Agency faced the prospect of the smallest budget increase for years, and this has already resulted in the redefinition or demise of several projects (see Nature 388615: 615: 1997).

The STA is also seeking approval to create new administrative positions. These include five new staff each to manage the transition of the troubled Power Reactor and Nuclear Fuel Corporation (PNC) into a new entity and to upgrade the agency's research evaluation scheme. The STA also wants to create a bioethics-related position inside its life science department.

Overall, the budget requests appear to recognize what critics of the country's public research infrastructure have asserted for some time: that Japan should improve the quality and strategic orientation its research, rather than simply expanding funding.