Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 29 April 2008
266 Deputy Michael D. Higgins asked the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the total sum spent to date in each year of the €3.8 billion Government allocation under the Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation 2006 to 2013; and if he will give details of the €2.7 billion due to have been allocated and spent by 2008. [15982/08]
View answerThe Government, when approving the Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation in 2006, agreed that the full implementation of the Strategy had been costed at €3.8 billion over existing levels of service. In accepting the overall costings of the Strategy, the Government also agreed that decisions on the provision of funds for the Strategy would have to be taken in the context of the National Development Plan (NDP) 2007-2013. The Science, Technology and Innovation Sub Programme of the NDP 2007-2013 provides for a total investment of €6.1 billion in the programme areas below:
|
Cost |
|
|
World Class Research STI |
€3.46 billion |
|
Enterprise STI |
€1.29 billion |
|
Agri-Food Research |
€641.00 million |
|
Energy Research |
€149.00 million |
|
Marine Research |
€141.00 million |
|
Geo-science |
€33.00 million |
|
Health research |
€301.00 million |
|
Environment Research |
€93.00 million |
|
Total |
€6.10 billion |
This investment in human capital, physical infrastructure and commercialisation of research is complemented by investment in other Sub Programmes in the Plan relating to R&D conducted by the Higher Education sector and the IDA. Taking account of these amounts, the total committed expenditure in Science, Technology and Innovation over the period of the NDP is €8.2 billion. As part of the NDP Monitoring System, information on progress and outturns is provided by Departments to the Department of Finance about the Science, Technology and Innovation Programme of the NDP. Work is ongoing on the preparation of the 2007 NDP progress report which will be submitted later this year to the Oireachtas and which will set out expenditure, including expenditure on the NDP STI Programme, in the first operational year of the NDP.
