I thank the Chairman and the Senators and Deputies on the committee. It is a pleasure to be here at this meeting, which is my first opportunity to address the Oireachtas in any way like this. Having returned from Germany where I spent 15 years, it is great to have this opportunity to address the committee.
I wish to make it clear that we are an agency under the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. At the same time, we are totally interdependent with the higher education institutes because that is where much of our work is carried out. Hence the appropriateness of our being here today.
Science Foundation Ireland was set up to fill a gap in the system. There is a need in the increasingly sophisticated world in which industry is working to have higher quality people trained, more people with PhDs and higher quality research performed such that there are opportunities for spin-offs or intellectual property but, more specifically, to make high-quality industry with an interest in research more attracted to Ireland.
We have funding of the order of €1.4 billion in the national development plan up to 2013, so we have a major responsibility with the discharge of that money. We are not working in isolation. In particular, we work very closely with the IDA, Enterprise Ireland and the Higher Education Authority. We have made many strong linkages with those agencies to ensure we have a joined-up team Ireland approach to this.
We are asked to numerically deliver a certain number of PhDs and research groups. This is one of the aspects of the strategy for science technology and innovation, SSTI, the programme that is the basis of our work. We support about 300 groups around Ireland at a major level and a further 450 at a minor level as a component of their funding. We support about 700 postdocs and probably support about 1,500 PhDs in the system. Numerically, we are meeting all of our goals, which is an important aspect. In doing so, we work with the universities. Outcomes from that in the short term can be measured as papers, outcomes in the medium term can be measured as people and outcomes in the longer term in be measured in the industrial and economic consequences.
The industrial consequences are beginning to happen very rapidly. I will not quote chapter and verse on this but the document prepared for distribution gives some figures. We are dealing with up to 250 to 300 companies in the last year's report so there is considerable interaction that we would have expected from this funding that is happening.
Points that may be of particular interest to this committee include the question of space in the higher education institutes. There is a predictable requirement for space. If one multiplies the size of a group by the number of people by the square metres, one ends up with a figure. Getting that figure is the task of the Higher Education Authority, particularly through the programme for research in third-level institutions, the PRTLI, system. We have communicated as much as possible with the authority in terms of prediction. However, its decision are made for the long term. Our hope is that it will make them taking into account the requirements of the SSTI, which are, of course, competing with other requirements in third and fourth level education and research itself.
It is worthwhile being aware of the fact that the third-level education system is the cornerstone of many different things and we must nourish it well. If there is no adequate time and space for the research agenda, it will not be done anywhere else, other than perhaps some sections of Teagasc. This is something with which we are concerned.
Areas in which we are engaged to a lesser extent include the pipeline. This is a major question, relating as it does to from where the science will come. Some will come from outside but, of course, those who are developing in Ireland are the most important. We have a small input into that. Some of it comprises shared activity from the centres for science, engineering and technology, the CSETs. They spend about 5% of their budget on outreach. We launched a website during the week from one of them. We have had competitions and debates, all the things one wants to generate excitement and interest. We will continue to do that through those and other activities, targeting the secondary school teachers. There is much work to be done there and it is not only our work. However, we are very conscious of that.
This is a good opportunity to make some contact with the committee. We would like to reactivate an action called Friends of Science where we were available to talk to those Members of the Oireachtas who were interested in scientific topics. As it is now a cornerstone of the future economy beyond education, it is a very important topic and we will be coming back to the committee to present opportunities for it.
