Press Advisories

1. 9. 2009 14:06

Premier: “Science Reform Shall Not Be Exchanged For Crisis Management“

A round table on the future of Czech science was held in Prague’s Lichtenštejnský Palace yesterday.

Prime Minister Jan Fischer has described the meeting as highly beneficial. He had agreed with the officials of the country’s scientific community that new mechanisms for funding science have to be sought, a new methodology for its evaluation should be introduced, and relations and interaction between the departmental and academic research sectors have to defined.

“The economic crisis has been aggravating the situation in the institutional impact of science and research. Reform of science shall not be exchanged for any crisis management regime, and that is also a message sent to the next government, urging it to carry on these reform efforts,“ Premier Jan Fischer said after the joint meeting.

For their part, representatives of the Czech science community agreed that the current system of assessing scientific results is not ideal, and must be changed. The science community is also facing a debate on the structure of academic institutes.

“We are faced with a debate on the institutional arrangement of the research sector, on the structure of academic research centres to be able to support the best and weed out the inferior ones in a bid to promote the competitiveness of this country. That will be the topic of the next round-table,“ Premier Jan Fischer was quoted as saying.

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