Academy of Finland Newsletter, August-September 2007
The Academy of Finland newsletter will keep you updated on basic research funded in Finland and on other news from the Finnish world of science and research. In case you wish us to send this to someone else in your organisation or if you do not want to receive these newsletters in the future, please let us know at viestinta@aka.fi.

Features:
Finland to enhance the use of research infrastructures 
Budget proposal: Increases in science appropriations
Development strategy for Finnish sectoral research
Ministry of Education to prepare development plan for education and research
Finns active participants in FP6
Academy of Finland to review state and quality of Finnish scientific research
Academy and Tekes to launch impact assessment 
Academy to launch new research programme: Responding to Public Health Challenges
BONUS-169 programme to launch first joint call
Mikael Fogelholm appointed Director of the Academy's Health Research Unit 
Mervi Taalas appointed Director of the Academy's Finance Administration Unit 
Scroll down for more on these stories.

FINLAND TO ENHANCE THE USE OF RESEARCH INFRASTRUCTURES
Finnish Minister of Education and Science Sari Sarkomaa supports a longer-term and new kind of mechanism for national funding of research infrastructures. This is also the proposal of the research infrastructure committee that has assessed that infrastructure funding in Finland is not sufficient in international comparison.

The committee proposes that Finland should establish mechanisms for competed funding of research infrastructures and equipment. This calls for more centralised planning of and increased financial investment in research infrastructures as well as long-term solutions and permanent structures for funding. Finland should create an infrastructure policy that is based on an overall view of the goals of research and innovation policy and that also includes strategic choices.

The committee further proposes that Finland set up a permanent body to outline infrastructure policies and strategies and determine related funding policies. The permanent research infrastructure body should regularly review the current state of infrastructures and assess the long-term needs (roadmap) of different research fields in terms of infrastructures, including participation in international research infrastructures.

According to Minister Sarkomaa, it is at least as important to develop the present infrastructures and to improve their use as are the needs for new infrastructures. As the Finnish research system is very scattered, cooperation between different actors should be further developed.  Minister Sarkomaa further points out that the boundaries between organisations and administrative sectors as well and between the public and private sectors must be crossed. "Research making use of new technology requires more extensive and closer collaboration both nationally and internationally. Cooperation is needed in order to bring together special knowledge and know-how available in different countries and institutions as well as to compile and utilise different data material. Cooperation is also needed for setting up and maintaining expensive laboratories and equipment," she says.

BUDGET PROPOSAL: INCREASES IN SCIENCE APPROPRIATIONS 
The Finnish Ministry of Education proposes an increase of 319.3 million euros in the 2008 budget for appropriations of the administrative sector of science, education and culture. The total expenditure within the administrative sector amounts to 6,884.5 million euros. The increases are based on the Government programme and, regarding research appropriations, on the recommendations by the Science and Technology Policy Council of Finland.

The focus areas of education and science policy include raising the quality and increasing the impact of education and research, securing competent workforce and developing the institutions of higher education.

The Ministry proposes increases in funding for universities and science, and an increase of 20.3 million euros in the budget authority of the Academy of Finland for research appropriations. The Academy operates within the administrative sector of the Ministry of Education.

The amount of expected proceeds from Veikkaus, the Finnish National Lottery, is estimated to be about 419 million euros, of which the proposed share of science is 77.1 million euros.

DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY FOR FINNISH SECTORAL RESEARCH
The Finnish Government has made a decision-in-principle on the development strategies of government sectoral research. The thematic areas of sectoral research were confirmed to include the following four: regional and community structures and infrastructures; knowledge and know-how and work and wellbeing; sustainable development; and security. Sectoral research refers to research activities that support societal and political decision-making and other development of society and its various sectors.

The advisory council of sectoral research and its sub-committees will outline research entities, i.e. research agendas, on the basis of the assessed societal research need and research assignments proposed by ministries. The council is concerned to enhance the direction of sectoral research and to strengthen the utilisation of research. Ministries and other research funding agencies will agree on and see to the carrying out of research assignments. The advisory council will support the ministries in the implementation of research programmes.

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION TO PREPARE DEVELOPMENT PLAN FOR EDUCATION AND RESEARCH
The Finnish Ministry of Education is drafting a development plan for education and research for 2007–2012. The development plan will define in more detail the policies drawn up for education and research in the Government programme. The plan draft sets a target to raise the knowledge level of the population so that it would approach the world-leading level. Finland needs a strong knowledge base in order to be successful in the global competition and to improve the population's well-being and prevent marginalisation. The researcher career system will be further developed.

The target is by the year 2020 to increase, for instance, the share of the population with a higher education degree to 42 per cent. The plan draft also includes tentative quantitative targets for the education supply for 2012. By level of education, the education supply would be divided so that vocational education would account for somewhat more than a half and higher education institutions for somewhat less than a half. Supply would be decreased in cultural fields as well as in the fields of the humanities and education, natural sciences, and natural resources and the environment, whereas supply would be increased in the social fields, health and sports as well as in basic vocational education in the field of engineering and traffic.

The Government is expected to discuss and make a decision on the development plan by the end of 2007.

FINNS ACTIVE PARTICIPANTS IN FP 6
Participation by Finns in the EU Sixth Framework Programme for Research has been good. On the EU level, the average success rate has been about 18 and for Finland 25. The success rate varies between different programmes. In the whole Union, a total of 8,861 projects where funded through FP6; Finns were involved in 1,052 of these, with a total of 1,439 participations.

Of Finnish participants, 35 per cent are universities, 29 per cent business companies, 27 per cent research institutes and 9 per cent other actors.

ACADEMY OF FINLAND TO REVIEW STATE AND QUALITY OF FINNISH SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
The Academy of Finland drafts once during its Research Councils' term a review of the state and quality of Finnish scientific research. The previous reviews were published in 1997, 2000 and 2003, and the next review will be published in 2009.

In 2004–2006, the Academy carried out the SIGHT 2006 programme that included impact projects of Academy funding (6 reports), a project on Finnish science in international comparison (1 report), and the science and technology foresight project FinnSight 2015 (3+2 reports).

The SIGHT 2006 programme formed an entity that was not, however, published as a single volume. This was because of the special nature of the project and the huge amount of data. In the report to be published in 2009, the Academy will review Finnish science within the global and European spheres and assess its state and quality by means of comparisons and indicators to be determined. The report will present development policies for the Finnish research system on the basis of a number of analyses and assessments. 

The report reviewing the state and quality of Finnish scientific research 2009 will deal with, for instance, the Finnish research system and its changes, Finland on the world map, the structural development of the public research system, as well as the Academy and science in terms of the Finnish innovation system. It will also include a number of thematic analyses. Further, the report will present development strategies of the Finnish research and innovation system and the Academy.

The Academy will appoint a steering group for the project reviewing the state and quality of Finnish scientific research. The group will be chaired by the Academy's President and its members are the Chairs of the Academy's Research Councils, an Academy Board member, the Academy's Vice President (Research), Director for Development and Evaluation, a representative of universities and a representative of government research institutes. Panels composed of outside experts will be used during the course of the project.

ACADEMY AND TEKES TO LAUNCH IMPACT ASSESSMENT
On proposal by the Science and Technology Policy Council, the Academy of Finland and Tekes have launched an impact assessment project. The aim is to establish a coherent way to describe the impact of science, technology and innovation at different stages. The outcome of this study will be published in a report that describes, by means of various indicators, the changes in knowledge and know-how and their impact in Finland. The work will be completed by early 2009.

ACADEMY TO LAUNCH NEW RESEARCH PROGRAMME: RESPONDING TO PUBLIC HEALTH CHALLENGES
The Academy of Finland is preparing a research programme under the title Responding to Public Health Challenges (SALVE). The programme will focus on the identification of aetiological as well as hereditary and environmental factors, on the one hand, and on the prevention of diseases affecting public health, on the other. The programme will make good use of the special features of the infrastructure of the Finnish population and society, particularly the health care registers and population data systems. It further seeks to combine, besides a genetic and epidemiological approach, also a societal and behavioural approach in research of diseases of public health importance.

The call for applications is scheduled to be announced in December. Within the programme, funding will be granted to extensive multidisciplinary consortium projects in particular. The programme is also seeking foreign funding cooperation partners.

BONUS-169 PROGRAMME TO LAUNCH FIRST JOINT CALL
The BONUS ERA-NET project coordinated by the Academy of Finland has from 2004 onwards made preparations for a joint research programme of all Baltic Sea countries, called BONUS-169. BONUS-169 is aimed at creating a long-term framework for close research policy collaboration within Baltic Sea countries and at supporting the sustainable development of the Baltic Sea region.

The BONUS-169 programme's first joint call is launched in September 2007. The call is open to researchers in all Baltic Sea countries. Funding will be granted to scientifically high-level projects involving researchers from at least two Baltic Sea countries. The themes of the call are: Linking Science and Policy; Understanding Climate Change and Geophysical Forcing; Combating Eutrophication; Achieving Sustainable Fisheries; Protecting Biodiversity; Preventing Pollution; and Integrating Ecosystem and Society.

The funding announced open for application is designed to support research that enhances our understanding and predictive capacity of the Baltic Sea ecosystem's response to various impending changes. Another objective is to identify connections between environmental problems and societal and economic changes and to create a basis for deliberate and sustainable management.

The BONUS+ call provides funding worth a maximum of 23–25 million euros for three/four-year research projects. The funding consists both of national funding and funding from the European Commission. The funding share of the Academy of Finland is about four million euros, of which one million euros is allocated to research projects that, when successful, are assessed to have healing impacts on the state of the Baltic Sea environment. 

The programme has a key role in implementing the EU Maritime policy and Marine Strategy and is a science and research equivalent to the environmental protection work of the Baltic Marine Environment Protection Committee (HELCOM). Other key objectives include the development of research related to management of the state of the socio-economic and maritime environment as well as research collaboration with Russia.

ERA-NET is an EU funding scheme aimed at developing cooperation between national research programmes and research funding agencies.

MIKAEL FOGELHOLM APPOINTED DIRECTOR OF THE ACADEMY'S HEALTH RESEARCH UNIT
The Academy of Finland has appointed Doctor of Food Sciences Mikael Fogelholm Director of the Academy's Health Research Unit. He has previously been Director of the UKK Institute. The Academy's Health Research Unit answers for the preparation, presentation and execution of matters within the scope of the Research Council for Health as well as for the follow-up and monitoring of projects funded by the Council. In 2006, the Research Council for Health made funding decisions worth about 40.5 million euros, which accounts for 18 per cent of all Academy research funding decisions.

MERVI TAALAS APPOINTED DIRECTOR OF THE ACADEMY'S FINANCE ADMINISTRATION UNIT
Doctor of Economics Mervi Taalas has been appointed Director of the Academy of Finland Finance Administration Unit. Taalas comes to the Academy from the UN Secretariat's Unit responsible for peace keeping funding in New York. During 2001–2004, she worked in the financial administration of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-test-ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO) in Vienna. In the Finnish National Gallery, from where she was on leave of absence due to work abroad, Taalas worked as Head of Finance and as Finance Secretary. She gained her doctorate in the UK and has published refereed articles in her field of research.
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Academy of Finland in brief: The Academy's objective is to promote high-level scientific research through long-term quality-based research funding, research and science policy expertise and efforts to strengthen the position of science and scientific research. The Academy makes decisions on research funding worth about 260 million euros. Each year about 5,000 people benefit from Academy research funding. For more information, go to www.aka.fi/eng or send a message to maj-lis.tanner@aka.fi.