The new Minister of Science and Technology Jesse Chacon gave some interesting numbers the other day when he announced that from now on the corporate contributions to science will be centralized and decided at FONACIT. Since Chacon has no clue as to what he is saying someone is feeding him numbers. Let’s see some of them. First, he said that Venezuela’s expenditure per capita in science and technology is the highest in the world at something like 2.86% of GDP, which I will approximate to be 3% for simplicity.
He then said that Venezuela had six thousand-plus scientists, a number that I find somewhat exaggerated, but I will believe Jesse for once and use it.
Well, if you say GDP is 200 billion US$ (it’s higher), then 3% of 200 billion US$ is 6 billion US$, which means that each of those scientists, whose publications dropped by 15% in 2008, had the Government spend 923,000 thousand dollars on them. That’s high anywhere. I remember that number at Bell Labs, the best funded research lab in the world twenty years ago was US$ 2.5 million per scientist per year. There has been inflation, but it has not been so much and these were the best scientists in the world in Physics, Chemistry, Materials and Computers.
But let’s look closer. A tenured scientist in Venezuela makes less than Bs. 100,000 a year (US$ 46,000 at the official rate of exchange). So, given that scientists say there is no money for research, we have to say like Luis Herrera: Donde estan los reales? (Where is the money?).
Because the Minister himself gave the Locti numbers for universities and said all universities received 336 million Bolivars from Locti or barely US$ 156 million, for all universities!. Given that most research in Venezuela is done at the universities, you have to wonder where the rest of the money went. IVIC I don’t believe has a budget of more than US$ 30-40 million, Intevep barely does anything, so the whole thing is quite mysterious.
But the most dangerous part is that Chacon seems to suggest that the money is not well distributed, because Universidad Central is the top beneficiary, followed by Universidad Simon Bolivar and Universidad Catolica in fourth place. The Minister then asks (In El Nacional, June 4th. page C-3) how can Simon Bolivar which does not have the diversity of laboratories that exists in other universities receive so much money?(The only one missing from the top list is Universidad de Los Andes)
Well, I don’t know the answer off the bat, but how about that at Simon Bolivar, more Professors have Ph.D.’s or do research? Or higher academic standards? Or tougher to get tenure? Just to name a few possibilities. And he also attacks Universidad Catolica wondering what the hell does that university spend Bs. 45 million (US$ 20.93 million) in science for? Maybe the Minister should have found about what that was before making statements to the press. I wonder how much the Armed Forces University gets, Chacon did not mention it, but we all know its budget was increased in 2009 as the other university’s budgets were reduced, despite the low academic evel of UNEFA.
But, of course, I bet that in the US$ 6 billion the Government included the payment for Satellite Simon Bolivar (US$ 400 million), which while rotating in orbit, it does not quite fly and nobody knows if it came with a warranty or not. Of course, that satellite was neither science nor technology. So, you wonder what other misnomers are included in Chacon’s numbers.
Spying equipment? Firewalls to filter the Internet one day?
Who knows, but clearly the former Lt. was placed there to destroy oligarchic science, the same one that on the same day, last Thursday, celebrated at Fundacion Polar, the achievements of five Venezuelan scientists*, who do research, publish and are well known internationally for their high quality work, but none of which has a clue as to where their million bucks a year is.
Clearly, the revolution has no use for them.
(*One of which is a relative of the author)
June 8, 2009 at 10:58 am
Well said and calculated as usual. It’s of interest that none of the Polar Prize winners seem to have a doctoral degree (if eud.com is not missing it). Might that be another symptom of our problems?
June 8, 2009 at 4:42 pm
“The new Minister of Science and Technology Jesse Chacon” QUE QUE QUE QUE???????????????
Me estoy desayunando la noticia. En donde se sacó el PhD en investigaciones cientificas el señor para merecer el título de ministro de ciencia y teconología?
June 8, 2009 at 4:43 pm
“teconología”
exactamente.
June 8, 2009 at 5:07 pm
Well, in defense of the Government (believe it or not), it has been a while since having a Ph.D. or knowing about science has anything to do with being Minister, but Chacón has clearly absolutely no knowledge about either. This is part of the robolution’s belief that anyone can do anything, after all, Chávez is President, no?
June 8, 2009 at 5:57 pm
“none of the Polar Prize winners seem to have a doctoral degree”
Actually, they do have PhDs (not sure if all of them, but AFAIK at least 3 of them have the degree).
June 8, 2009 at 6:43 pm
I believe all of them have Ph.D.’s, but in any case, each of them has published at least three dozen scientific papers in international journals and are recognized as experts in their field. Chacon is a fascist killer.
June 8, 2009 at 8:02 pm
Confirmed, all of the five winners of the Polar award this year have Ph.D.’s
June 8, 2009 at 8:55 pm
Would the Miguel Octavio here be the same one who obtained the Polar prize in 1983?
June 8, 2009 at 11:46 pm
Miguel,
This post took me on a day of reading about Venezuelan science, particularly the work of Marcel Roche on the sociology of science in Venezuela. For all those interested, see Roche’s biblography: http://sedlc.ivic.ve/index.php?mod=lista.php
There is a great write up on the history and evolution of CONICIT until the mid 90′s. I can see that those who ignore history are bound to repeat it.
The whole “endogenous science and technology” concept had been brandied about in Venezuela since the 70′s. Roche shows why the science component was relatively OK, but the technology one failed–one of which was that the government was the largest enterpreneur (a situation that is even more marked today). On the other hand, CONICIT became more politicized with time (something that, again, is likely more marked today).
So, it seems like we keep repeating the same mistakes of the past.
June 9, 2009 at 7:17 am
Pelao: Let’s say you are on the right track.
June 9, 2009 at 8:20 am
http://www.fundacionempresaspolar.org/premiolmf/1983/octavio.jpg
June 18, 2009 at 11:00 am
As usual, Miguel does it right in the back of an envelope. However, I would like to go one-step further, concentrate on the issue of 2.7% of the GNP for R&D in Venezuela and use the other side of Miguel’s envelope! Let us see.
Traditionally and up to 2005/2006, the accepted figure of investment in R&D in Venezuela was 0.4%. Let us assume for the sake of the argument that that number is correct and since its represent the contribution of the government to R&D via the budget of the ministry, and the budget of its centers of research such as IVIC, FUNVISIS, IDEA, CIDA , Ciepe and other smaller ones together with the money allocated by higher education to the various CDCHs of universities were 80% of the Venezuelan research is carried out plus some token money from INTEVEP that although it is doing nothing keeps paying salaries to its staff…. well this is the backbone of science in the country AND SINCE THE BUDGET IN REAL TERMS of these instances of research did not vary much from 2007 or 2008 then I GUESS IT IS SAFE TOI ASSUME that that part of science represent 0.4% of the GNP. Now, LOCTI comes into scene in force in 2007 and 2008. How much money LOCTI represents… well, this is relatively easy to ascertain. LOCTI calls for 0.5% up to 2% of the gross revenues of a certain number of enterprises. For the sake of the argument, let us say that on average enterprises contribute with 1% of their gross revenues to LOCTI. Well, given the fact that gross sales of private enterprises represent at most 40% of the GNP, the overall contribution of LOCTO to R&D cannot be higher that 0.4% of GNP. Add those two and you get 0.8% but let us be generous and rounded it up to 1% under the item others…. that 1% is very far from 2,69% of Jesse.
Since this post is already too long, I shall leave to question in look of an answer…1) If 2.69% GNP for R&D is right, could someone now tell us how that money was spent? 2) I am assuming that LOCTI money, that 0,4% of GNP REALLY went into research and development within the local enterprises BUT we all know that THERE IS NOT A SINGLE MAJOR industry in Venezuela that has a R&D unit operative (the last one was POLAR and shut it down a couple of years ago…. Thus, the question is…what do have to say our CEO of Venezuelan enterprices about LOCTI destined for R&D but used for other purposes?