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The launching of the Funding Program for World-Leading Innovative R&D on Science and Technology, or by way of acronym “FIRST Program,” and selection of 30 projects was reported in the Autumn 2009 issue of JSPS Quarterly. On 9 March, the Cabinet Office’s Council for Science and Technology Policy determined the amount of funding to be disbursed to each project and selected the research institutions that will provide primary operational support for each of them and their core researchers. Amidst a severe budgetary environment, the Cabinet Office took ample time to make a very careful examination of the projects’ research plans when making these decisions. On 10 March, JSPS notified each project of the amount of funding they will receive and, upon request from their operational support institutions, began disbursing it. The 30 projects are now getting their research activities off the starting blocks for what will be a run up to March 2014. Over this period, they will receive an aggregate ¥100 billion. Most of the research-funding systems in Japan operate on a single-year basis. In contrast, the FIRST Program disburses its grants from a Fund established within JSPS, which gives the researchers a large measure of flexibility in using their funding by carrying it over from one fiscal year to the next across multi-years. Accordingly, the research projects were able to get off to a smooth start even though their first accounting year ended later in the same month of March. What may be touted as the FIRST Program’s hallmark feature is that it allows the core researchers to choose their own operational support institutions. Most of the other research-funding programs in Japan are set up to have the researcher’s own affiliated institution support the project. As a result, even when researchers believe that another institution could provide more effective and efficient support for their work, they are not able to ask that institution to do so. To resolve this problem, the operational support institution under the FIRST Program is selected based on the core researcher’s designation. Some of the core researchers of the selected projects have in fact chosen research institutions other than their own as their project’s operational support institution. Introducing this system is expected to allow researchers to concentrate fully on their work and make optimal use of their capabilities in advancing cutting-edge research and development. More information can be found on the FIRST Program’s webpage (http://www.jsps.go.jp/english/e-first/), which outlines the scheme and lists the selected research themes. - Special Research Funds Management Division I  |
