Agricultural Research in Spain: Experiences Relevant to Latin America
Creators: name: Herruzo, A. Casimiro
name: Echeverría, Ruben G.
name: Herruzo, A. Casimiro
name: Echeverría, Ruben G.
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 1993
Subjects: Agricultural and Food Policy

description: This paper examines the recent evolution of the Spanish agricultural research system particularly from the stand point of lessons from it that appear relevant to Latin America. Two important actions were taken during the 1980s to transform the country's science and technology system into making a positive impact on agricultural research productivity: budgetary increases and institutional reforms. The general law of science, establishing a national plan to connect all research agents and improve priority-setting mechanisms, was the main institutional change towards the foundation of the current system. Universities have been reoriented towards research. Also intellectual property-right mechanisms have been improved. The recent transformation of the country's administrative structure to a decentralized decision-making system, where autonomous communities have important roles in setting an agricultural technology agenda, has also contributed to shaping the current research system. Public agricultural research in Spain is conducted by four organizations: the Higher Council of Scientific Research, the National Institute for Agricultural Research, the Regional Agricultural Research Services, and the universities. Input and food companies and commodity associations are the main private-sector research organizations. In 1990 there were approximately 707 researchers in the private sector and 'lIJ72 in the public sector. Both public- and private-sector research expenditures increased since the mid-1970s, particularly after 1983. Estimates of total research expenditures for 1990 are close to USS 300 million. In the new system of financing agricultural research, the traditional vertical allocation of funds from departments in Ministries, regional governments and firms is complemented with a national fund for research. Several organizations and mechanisms have been established to improve the interaction between public and private research. The agricultural and socioeconomic environments in Spain and Latin America are clearly different; nevertheless there are some lessons from Spain's recent experience which could be of particular use to Latin America. Foremost among these is the approach taken to overcome constraints facing the science and technology system. This included a change in the structure and organization of the research system accompanied by adequate and sustained funding as well as coordination among funding sources and recipients. Of special interest is how the current Spanish system has dealt with a set of key issues that could be important at the time of designing reforms in Latin America. These are: a) defining a science and technology system; b) providing adequate and sustained funding; c) reorganizing and decentralizing the system (without a substantial increase in management costs and with a minimum loss of effectiveness); d) establishing the roles of the public sector, the private sector, and the universities as components of the system and mobilizing private resources into research; and e) creating an efficient structure to generate and transfer research results with adequate upstream, downstream and horizontal links among research institutions, policymakers and social groups.