Study pointed to changes in the FCT but not extinction
A study commissioned in 2023 by the FCT (Foundation for Science and Technology) pointed to the need to reformulate the entity, but not to its extinction or merger.
The document, commissioned in 2023 from the LCB when Elvira Fortunato was Minister of Science in the last socialist government of António Costa, proposed that the FCT be organized by areas of knowledge rather than by financial instruments. However, it does not suggest the need for its abolition, reports Público , which reveals the content of the study. The FCT is organized by financial instruments reflected in the existing departments: the Department of Advanced Training is responsible for supporting research grants; the Department of Programs and Projects for research project competitions; and the Department of Institutional Support for supporting scientific employment and scientific institutions. These departments, on the other hand, are dedicated to both the administrative and financial aspects as well as the scientific component.
The study highlights the need for a "clarification of the FCT's mission and focus," focusing more "on scientific evaluation and monitoring than on controlling the financial execution of funding instruments," which would have an impact on the FCT's organizational structure.
Therefore, he proposed an organization guided by scientific areas, specifically with the creation of a Department of Scientific Affairs. This would have three major divisions by area: life sciences; physical sciences and engineering; and social sciences and humanities. He then proposed the establishment of a Department of International Relations; a Department of Digital Science Services; a Department of Funding Management; and a Department of Internal Management. This would separate the scientific component from the administrative, financial, and accounting aspects.
The study was based on interviews with FCT employees and compared with practices and agencies in other countries, such as France, Germany, Austria, Finland, Sweden, Belgium and the United States.
Fernando Alexandre, speaking to CNN , admitted that the government intends to go further than the reorganization proposal presented by the FCT's management. In that interview, the Minister of Education assured that the objective of the FCT's abolition is to "bring science closer to innovation" and that the proposed plan "is part of an exercise that the FCT's management itself carried out" and presented to the government. "The FCT will be with us" in implementing this transformation in the field of science, which will lead to the creation of the Agency for Science and Innovation.
The Government wants to create a new Research and Innovation Agency that will incorporate the FCT and ANI.
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