13 March ,1997

The Honorable Richard Lugar
Chairman, Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition & Forestry
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510-6000

Dear Chairman Lugar:

In your January, 1997 letter you recognized that investment in agricultural research is vital to a strong America. The Council of Scientific Society Presidents (CSSP), the national science policy center of a consortium of presidents of scientific federations and professional societies covering over 100 disciplines and whose constituent societies have a total membership of over 1.5 million scientists and science educators, is pleased that we may offer assistance to your deliberations.

Your accompanying questions are very important and perspicacious, and address seven primary areas:

The structure of the agricultural research system Agricultural research funding mechanisms and allocation issues Extension service issues Private sector research linkage issues Agricultural research priority setting and coordination Accountability for federal research investments Other issues; e.g; line item veto, international linkages, consensus policy

We appreciate your consultation with the key stakeholders of the science research community in your quest to assure that America's world class science research community exercises its unique talents most wisely and effectively on behalf of the national interest.

We here enclose for your consideration some of our perspectives and recommendations on effective policy in these areas, based on both historic policy of the CSSP and CSSP Member reflections on your excellent questions. We also request the opportunity to expand our remarks in response to issues that arise during your Committee hearing.

INTRODUCTION

Federally supported agricultural research should be defined to encompass all of the research that is relevant for the overall agriculture and food sector. This means it should include all the research relevant to the production and management systems for agriculture, the food production system including nutrition, and the environmental and economic factors that relate to the agriculture and food system. We include all these in the term agricultural research.

CSSP's primary focus today is on foundational research for this broad agriculture, food, and environment sector. Foundational research is fundamental research that serves as the basis for either additional research or future applications.

Agricultural research is funded and conducted by three main entities: federal agencies including extramurally-funded research, state agencies (mainly universities), and the private sector. Our primary interest in this dialogue is the future federal responsibility to agricultural research. We suggest that the focus for federally-supported agricultural research should be foundational research; research of national scope and impact; research needed by other federal agencies for their missions; research of a scale/duration beyond the usual capacity of private research entities; and increasing the ratio of federal extramural to intramural funding; assigning research resources into the best ideas as determined by competitive merit review.

ACKNOWLEDGING TAXPAYER VALUE RECEIVED

You asked "what is the American public getting for its $1.8 billion in annual investment in agricultural research?" We would like to recognize at the outset that over a dozen well regarded studies, using different approaches and time frames, and different subject matters, have all concluded that the economic payoff of federal investment in agricultural research has been immense when assessed over adequately long periods of time. Conservatively, the internal rate of return on each dollar originally invested is 20-50 cents per year,(following a lag period) often every year for decades after the original investment, with an added spillover, or secondary capture rate (or what economists call social rate) of return nearly the same size. Rates of return of this magnitude indicate an economic inefficiency; that is, a historic underinvestment by the federal government in foundational agricultural research.

Agricultural research has not only been vital to the success of the American farm economy, but it has been one of the most critical elements of our national economy, providing not only over $55 billion/year in exports, but also producing a dramatic farming productivity increase that raised living standards throughout the world, reinforcing the potential for peace and international cooperation.

ESTABLISHING NATIONAL GOALS

Establishing overarching goals for the Nation are the roles of the American people, as expressed by their elected leaders, the Congress and Administration. We encourage the Congress and the Administration to advocate the agricultural research goals of developing a healthy, sufficient, affordable, stable, sustainable, safe food supply; enhancing productivity, value and global competitiveness; and ensuring the quality of the natural resource base for future generations. Linking research and education is effective public policy. The federal government must address and ensure for the Nation a robust long range foundational agricultural research enterprise and strengthen its supporting systems: a superb research university system, effective technology/knowledge transfer systems, and an unrivaled scientific workforce.

In addressing these proposed goals, we recommend that the federal government should commit to six inextricably linked major roles:

First, to champion the sources and systems of discovery and innovation in all science domains related to agriculture to ensure the US continues world leadership;

Second, to strengthen and build the capacity of US agricultural innovation sources, systems and processes as the critical key to sustained national strength and economic growth in a rapidly shifting worldwide economy.

Third, to assure adequate growth and consistent development of support for US long range foundational agricultural research.

Fourth, to energetically lay the foundations for a defined, dynamic, better US future in all outcomes related to agriculture.

Fifth, to assure the Nation has an evolving, comprehensive, strategic agricultural research plan that addresses the most important issues of the national future.

Sixth, and very importantly, to fund and conduct research for agriculture that is nationally relevant, addresses major national needs, contributes to a sustainable agricultural economy, and is both generic and foundational for furthering innovation and national goals. the structure of the agricultural research system

Your questions on the structure of the agricultural research system appear to be subsidiary to the primary question of how should our agricultural research system structure and delivery be changed to be prepared to meet the challenges of the agricultural sector in the next century.

The form should follow function, not the reverse. Adjusting the structure to make it more efficient is not the most productive strategy for the future, as it has been in the past. Instead, the focus should be how to develop structures for the research function that best promote the most robust creativity, innovation and increased probability of major breakthroughs. USDA structures built by accretion over a century and a half need to be rethought in all aspects that we foresee impacting in the future. Internet communications have revolutionized how scientists interact and collaborate and even publish results; this will accelerate as Internet-II and new distributed knowledge systems impact the future. The notion that a research institute or collaborating research team or even a university is at a place may become a relic of the 20th century, not the dominant creativity facilitator of the 21st century. Incorporating these and many other future realities should be done carefully, not precipitously. It entails evolution, observation, risk taking trials, evaluations, rethinking, and more evolution. This risk taking should be regularly encouraged by word and deed, not stifled by demanding efficiency instead of fostering creativity. Some new ventures will succeed better than others. The others are not failures to be condemned, they are valuable lessons that serve the common future. Will conversion to an NIH model bring the same degree of rapid research progress and world leadership in foundational research? The answer to this and your other system structure questions are not to opine or guess, but to try out a variety of options, routinely move in new directions, and find out answers. It is ironic that USDA research enterprise has so little chance to use the research process to improve itself.

agricultural research funding mechanisms and allocation issues

To fulfill the goals we hope you will pursue, we recommend that certain fundamental principles be applied to all aspects of foundational agricultural research, from setting priorities through delivering results, and that these be included in your coming authorization. These principles include:

Use overall sustainable agriculture as the core research framework for agriculture.

Emphasize foundational research: research that serves to lay foundations for either further fundamental discovery or future application.

Fund all research through competitive awards based on challenging merit reviews by qualified experts, where the criteria for evaluation are the quality and prospect of the ideas and their relevance to agricultural missions.

Use funding systems that are maximally competitive and open to all qualified scientists who wish to participate in research for agriculture.

Set priorities for federally-funded research consistent with addressing important scientific opportunity and probability of conferring significant, long-run national value.

Use a "bottom up" strategy in identifying needs and setting research priorities.

Ensure adequate focus on critically important issues through unified, strategic research and application plans that deal with such issues.

Reestablish by word and deed the "culture of connection" between the doing of research and the extending of research into applied practice.

Recognize that US research relevant to its agricultural sector is oftentimes also closely relevant to international food security and nutrition.

Get Congress out of micromanaging research through earmarks and out of funding special grants and other projects that circumvent a rigorous merit review process.

The proper balance among research allocation options can be either a political question or a scientific effectiveness question. We only address the latter aspect. The issue of allocation confronts how Congress assures the American taxpayers the most impact for their dollar invested in federal research. It is by ensuring that the best and most creative research ideas always receive precedence. Shifting funds among structures is probably not the solution. The questions you ask are questions of how to improve an already successful system that has been slow to adapt to the future in many ways, often because of your own imposition of constraints and suppression of risk taking.

Systems in place over a long time resist change unless confronted with very strong impetus. How can we create a win-win change instead of a zero-sum process? Over whatever time it takes, even 5-7 years, ALL federal USDA research funds, including those within USDA, should become allocated through a competitive, fair, external rigorous merit review process, that fosters and rewards creative and imaginative problem solving. To put principle as question: Why should not federal scientists receive funds and be rewarded by the same general standards as scientists throughout the Nation as a whole? By making its intent to do this clear now, Congress will make the planning and implementation more effective. Imposing such a change abruptly will be very disruptive. Providing a fixed and adequate period to adapt to this upgrading affords the opportunity to take the necessary steps incrementally and then revise and improve them. They are likely to need these iterations.

The inescapably important result of shifting the future federal agricultural research increments into extramural competitive merit reviewed opportunities for universities is that not only does the research needed by the nation become effectively accomplished, but an imaginative and highly trained workforce of creative problem solvers is developed by the university research and education linkage, and this young and vigorous workforce becomes infused into and all across the national agricultural enterprise on a regular basis. By also ensuring effective merit review of in-house USDA research, and ensuring its resources are stable, its quality of performance is likely to increase over time. Further invigorating our universities across all 50 states improves America in countless ways and is always in the national interest. The Nation wins. The universities win. UDSA in-house research improves, another win. The economic payoff provides that job-seekers and taxpayers win. Agricultural private industry captures the researchers and findings and also wins.

The NRI is the best USDA model of future direction for agricultural research funding. Priorities are set by research leaders who live on the frontiers of areas of high potential for scientific progress. Such vision may precede by years, even a decade or more, the perception of need or crisis that would drive the priorities if they were left to being reactive, or subject to recent events. NRI requires merit review by highly qualified scientific peers; this ensures that the next generations of US scientists stay the on top of world competition. Because so many high quality ideas and creative solutions are left unfunded by the limitations of funding in NRI, the sooner we can move to reach the Congressionally authorized $500 million/yr for NRI the better for the national interest in future years.

Earmarked and other research allocations that evade rigorous merit review do not serve the long run national interest; they do just the opposite. The new generation of researchers on whom we will depend long after our time, are receiving this new message: it is not what you know, but who you know in Congress that counts. When it is not the scientific merit of one's ideas but the persuasive ability to sell non-scientist politicians that gets results, the processes required to develop our researchers into the world's best scientists, those whose ideas can succeed at competitive peer review, is aborted. When, as now, many of those whose imaginative ideas were peer- reviewed and found highly meritorious, are not funded for lack of funds, see those whose ideas failed to even qualify to compete get funded, the whole national research system is badly damaged.

In the federal quest to elicit increased state and private funding for agricultural research, a target institution is the university research park. Developing incentives to such parks, above the extension of R&D tax credits, that do not distort the unique educational missions and directions of university research will be a challenge for the 105th Congress.

agricultural research priority setting and coordination

Government officials and research agency top administrators often see research priorities as territorial imperatives and their roles as top-down direction setting. The actual foundational researchers are most successful when ignoring and disrespecting enclosures around their thinking or territorial boundaries in their research, when they are exploring the edges of knowledge. They seek to imagine, to discover and to innovate, to define and solve highly complex problems. They work from the frontiers of what is known into terrain with no prior footprints. They can see what might be done, and what areas of knowledge are most open to expansion, in ways others do not. Their expertise is more diverse, more current and their scientific imagination more freely evident than most senior government or industry officials, never a part of, or long since removed from, the rapidly shifting frontiers of world class research.

We thus suggest that a bottom-up decision strategy for priorities will ultimately be more successful, and that the USDA should continue to be committed to utilizing the vast and deep expertise of the Nation's science research community, even more than previously, and certainly as the dominant priority setters for scientific research within a framework of definable national needs, but open every day to scientists' pioneering ideas beyond those boundaries, ideas that cannot be forseen nor included in priority planning, that can reshape the future agricultural landscape overnight (e.g: genetic engineering, mammalian cloning). All research has a common purpose: to find out what we do not yet know, but want to know. Well designed research programs of national scope should connect to the overarching national goals, but be free to encourage and support the unforseen and the young scientist's untried ideas. To keep abreast of national needs, we encourage the Department of Agriculture to establish expert advisory panels on a regular basis to ensure diverse and fresh perspectives are brought to bear on important areas. To be most useful to the national interest such panels must be time-limited with a specific sunset clause; where this is longer than one year, the terms of panel members should rotate often enough to ensure a continuing flow of fresh perspectives. All members of such panels should be chosen on the basis of merit and relevant expertise and all panels should operate openly and publicly. To the extent that advisory boards for agricultural research are heavily based on business interests as advisors, their USDA advisory role needs to be directed to definitions of the challenges and directional recommendations, not specific research decisions, and on long term (10-15 year) perspectives, not quick fixes.

The CSSP is now engaged in formulation of research agendas for the 21st Century; we would be pleased to help the Congress and the USDA by developing a list of many important unanswered research questions as part of the process of developing each 5 year Farm Bill.

extension service issues

The Nation has an excellent, world leading fundamental research capacity in its top doctorate-granting universities and an excellent technology application capacity in its businesses. The middle range of research entities and innovation and connection systems are not as well developed or understood. An unmet national priority is to study these mid-level connection systems, develop and test many alternative models to improve them and support the models that work best over the long term. The high social rate of return (20-50% per annum) reported in many retrospective studies of federal research returns indicates an effective linkage of research into application in agriculture. CSREES (Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service) and its partnerships with state universities and colleges (Land-Grant and related institutions) is part of that innovation-connection enterprise that brings together the fruits of research with the stakeholders who will use it and can bring new ideas for research challenges across the Nation's state research communities. Directions that should improve its success over time include further integration of its functions; further enhancement of communications; and ongoing exchange of its people with top research universities. The Extension Service (ES) and Cooperative Extension (CE) have been effective in disseminating research and providing major support for the development and advancement of the US agricultural sector. The characteristics of the "user community" and of the problems, issues, and research results are now very different than previously, and created unprecedented contexts for the extension function. New models for extending knowledge and technology are rapidly emerging. An analytical study commissioned in every decade on how best to most effectively deliver research-based agricultural knowledge and technologies would be one productive option, but encouraging the CSREES system itself to perform such inquiry every year and apply its findings would be better.

All components of the agricultural sector can benefit from the expertise and attention by ES (CE). An ES-CE mission focused on farms and farming, rural communities, food and nutrition, and sustainable agriculture and infrastructure issues may serve the nation well. The Extension Service (and CE) should more formally and systematically extend to incorporating researchers and research results of the Agricultural Research Service and all university based research. As a general proposition, it is usually valuable to co-locate major research facilities and scientists—whether federal or state—in the same site because there is a significant value in having a wide range of colleagues for collaboration, stimulation, and assistance. However, information technologies are impacting that premise. Universities in the next century will build new regional and state networks that offer improved service to their core mission of learning. Consideration should be given to creating multi-state, agroecological regional facilities to serve the interests of major agroecological zones of the Nation. These, and networks among federal agencies, rather than duplication of their efforts, will likely be integrated as part of the ES future. The ES might be seen as becoming an evolving physical internet--a network of relevant networks--as one thinks of its 21st century incarnation. It will be timely in this Reauthorization to determine the results the ES has produced and encourage it to regularly evaluate how it may produce more value in the 21st century.

The CRIS (Cooperative Research Information System) provides especially useful information, virtually invaluable in planning, priority-setting, and characterizing and understanding the agricultural research system. But, information technologies applicable to CRIS and user communities are rapidly changing. We need to determine how best to ensure that CRIS takes full advantage of these technologies and serves its customers effectively.

In essence, no part of the research system in USDA can remain static and adapt to changes at the same time. Every component must become an active part of a learning organization, that evolves to be more effective on a continuous basis, by trying new ideas all the time, eliminating those that fail and expanding those that work. Future legislation must provide both support and stimulus to this ongoing evolution, allowing prudent risk and occasional failure, instead of preventing what is needed to evolve. private sector research linkage issues

The public sector and private sectors contribute about equally to the total agricultural research and development of the Nation. Since the federally funded research is made promptly available to all, it provides great opportunity to enhance the social rate of return on federal investment.

Business R & D models define priorities as the most lucrative growth markets and most rapidly attained products or improvements on products that provide a competitive edge in those markets. Businesses are increasingly driven by international competition to shorter and shorter R&D time horizons. The success of the short-term business priority model depends on the depth and breadth of pre-product foundational research available from which to draw solutions; it cannot succeed alone on a sustained basis unless that research is available. Thus, it is clearly unwise policy to make short- term business demands the primary driver of federal research priorities. Effective foundational research often requires a decade or more of concentrated attention to make an important discovery. In some instances research projects are required, such as those in the Forest Service, to take 15 or more years to get the answer sought. But, it is indeed wise to ensure U.S. business interests ready access to new knowledge and implications of new discoveries and to ensure a continuing, iterative long term dialog with the research community to increase the probability of effective connection. The relative roles of industrial or federal funding for this approach should be seen as a spectrum of attributes that indicate primary sponsorship, not an absolute yes or no binary decision issue. When the research addresses a national problem, requires a long-term, carries high risk, or requires too large a size of investment to be likely to achieve a single business sponsor, it becomes a federal role to help the Nation by sponsorship. If the research has a short-term focus, addresses a local or regional problem, is a reasonable business risk, or is of a size likely to achieve a single business sponsor, it is not the federal role to support it. Thus, it is not an issue of the government picking winners nor providing corporate welfare but of how best to support the national interest. Defining the fuzzy territory in the middle of these two models of criteria may be made on a case by case basis until a clearer understanding has emerged. It should not be done arbitrarily.

The private sector will need a wide variety of discoveries and improved innovation systems to create higher value as price supports decline. If the past is any guide, many of these discoveries and innovations are the kinds which we might not even be able to imagine for several years. Setting rigid directions, or pushing private sector demands too soon may limit the direction of research imagination and decrease the chances of success. World food demand will rise faster than population growth because of, for example, the rising standard of living in Asia. This will open market opportunities for exporting value-added products instead of commodities.

accountablity for federal research investments

Congressional accountability to the nation's taxpayers for the federal investment in agricultural research can be best met by ensuring the quality of the research. Of all the mechanisms in use for that accountability, the most important is to ensure at the outset that the research proposals start by succeeding in the competitive marketplace of ideas. This is best achieved by an independent, high quality, continuous rigorous merit review process of all research proposals and an assurance that all qualified scientists have equal access to the opportunities.

It cannot be emphasized too strongly that research for the agriculture, food, and environmental sector should be done by those persons with the best ideas, strongest proven records, or most demonstrated promise—irrespective of their universities or research entity affiliations. Federal funding, through the USDA and otherwise, should be available to them and to all qualified scientists on the same merit-based competitive basis. This is the principle of quality and openness which is the guiding characteristic of the highly successful NSF and NIH systems. It is an important part of the scientific process that findings of importance are replicated by other scientists and found sound enough to build upon. It is a hallmark of good science. Duplication of research is thus not a problem of accountability per se; in fact its absence could well be, or lead to, a problem later. Scientists can usually readily distinguish wasteful duplication from necessary replication or useful multiple approaches to solving the same problem.

To achieve accountability and the desired objectives for focusing agricultural research on national goals and on foundational research, a number of steps might be undertaken during the next 5-10 years, including:

Increase steadily the fraction of the USDA budget devoted to foundational research in order to achieve the new knowledge needed to ensure world leadership for the Nation and provide the Nation its high rate of return to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Direct all increases in research funding from FY 1997 forward effectively peer-reviewed, investigator-initiated, extramural competitive grants of 3-5 year duration. Appropriate emphasis be given to multidisciplinary research programs and projects for the complexity of the priority needs and research questions and funded sufficiently to ensure good research progress.

Shift all internal USDA research during the next 5-7 years into extramurally- peer-reviewed competitive grants, with 5 year maximum renewals. All active USDA researchers should be encouraged to take brief sabbatic leaves every few years to conduct foundational research in top university laboratories, and vice-versa. Match minimum standards for retention and promotion of USDA research staff to those for retention and promotion at the top research US universities.

Establish as standard operating policy more robust knowledge and technology transfer systems for capture of foundational research into commercial value .

Establish an internal zero-base budget re-prioritization at regular intervals for all USDA internal research funds that includes emerging opportunities.

All Congressional research-related earmarks and any special grants not subject to rigorous competitive merit review should be eliminated henceforth.

SELECTED ADDITIONAL ISSUES

International Agriculture: International agricultural research represents a special opportunity for the US agricultural research system: increasing indigenous food security throughout the world is the first key to stabilizing both population and democratic political systems and for laying the basis for subsequent economic development for US overseas markets. We need to provide sufficient resources to assist political stabilization and democratization worldwide. The situation is made all the more important for US interests because G-7 competitors are steadily expanding their internal and multilateral research funding.

In this Reauthorization we should include ways to link, through an ongoing federal mechanism, US-based researchers with the established Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research international agricultural research centers and the national agricultural research systems for developing countries. The program could have several key elements: (i) incentives for participation and partnership with the International and National Centers (ii) bona fide significant commitment by the US-based scientists and institutions; (iii) awards through peer-review; and (iv) regular evaluation for merit and relevancy.

Can the President Veto "Special Grants"? It appears that legislative history language and reports attached to Bills have no force of law and thus are only advisory, and the President under his old powers could thus have eliminated all such expenditures by a Presidential Order to all agencies requiring them to ignore such language directing the use of such appropriations, (cf Rep George Brown, D-CA, report in 104th Congress). The President's new line item veto authority would appear to enhance that authority into parts of actions actually taken by vote of the whole Congress, including any items defined by that new authority. Since neither item has been tested in the courts and the Line Item Veto appears to some to shift the Balance of Powers and seems to be on the verge of being so tested, we will await that court decision.

What Mechanisms Exist to Translate Scientific Consensus into Federal Policy? The Council of Scientific Society Presidents, representing over 100 disciplines of sciences and with total membership of constituent societies and federations of over 1.5 million, has served the Nation as an important source of advice on Federal policy for nearly 25 years. We were substantially responsible for establishing the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy and have had a cordial relationship with it ever since.

CSSP has addressed over 120 written questions from Members of Congress in the last 18 months. We received letters from both the President and Vice President responding to our national policy positions on a variety of issues. We are engaged in 1997 in the first steps to establishing a very long term scientific agenda for the next century. We expect it to be, as have prior CSSP policy directions, the subject of regular dialog with us among the Congress and the Administration.

We are holding a meeting this summer of key experts on unresolved controversial scientific issues whose resolution would make immense policy progress for the Nation, to try to reach a consensus. We hope this will be a continuing model for making progress on scientific controversies that impact national policy.

At the invitation of Members of Congress we have held briefings for large gatherings of Congressional staff on selected issues that require understanding of the science involved. This has proven to be a productive exchange and a useful two way Q & A opportunity. Most of our constituent societies are available to extend this activity and increase its frequency.

The National Academy of Sciences, while much smaller in membership, has served as a valuable part of that function for 130 years through the work of the National Research Council. The Academy was established to provide scientific advice to you. It publishes reports every month on a very wide variety of issues requested by the Congress. The National Science Board not only oversees the National Science Foundation, but also sets part of the national science policy in that process; it reports to the President. The President has his own small Council of Advisors on Science and Technology that meet regularly in Washington. The National Science & Technology Council, established by Presidential Order, for the first time coordinates domains of science activities across federal agencies. Its best aspects deserve to be codified into law.

Until recently, the Office of Technology Assessment served as a bipartisan Congressional sounding board for the Congress. Its process was investigation of issues that gathered recognized experts of all views together to argue and analyze and produce new understandings and ideas, and then writing their findings as a report to Congress, which always included a valuable list of explained options for Congress to act on technology rich issues. The complexity of such issues and their frequency will only grow. We would not hesitate to discuss with you establishment for Congress of a new bipartisan entity, covering both science and technology, and framed for the 21st century. Future credibility would come from both their direct bipartisan Congressional governance and their bridging the complexities of science and technology with those complexities faced by the Congress.

Due to the rapidly rising importance to the Nation's future of science, the Senate might want to evaluate the merits of establishing for the 21st century a full Science Committee, as the House has done, with a larger fraction of the Senate open to more frequent dialog on science issues and science-based issues. It would provide the opportunity for addressing issues from both the perspectives of Congress and the Science Community; setting agendas to achieve that, and holding discourse to convey two-way understanding from science and technology leaders to Senate leaders; it could be an important ongoing structural opportunity for us all.

Sincerely yours,

Martin A. Apple, PhD
Executive Officer