Royal Society’s Foreign Secretary responds to impact of Government ODA R&D budget cuts

Royal Society programmes funded from the BEIS ODA budget are being cut by around 70%. These grants amount to investment in future leaders in science, who are doing research that could have a global benefit and who were set to offer much to the UK.

Richard Catlow, Foreign Secretary of the Royal Society said, "We are extremely disappointed by these deep cuts to the ODA-funded R&D budget.

"We will no longer be able to fund an emerging generation of leading African scientists, some of whom have turned their talents and attention to the COVID pandemic in the past year, and others who are working on the ongoing crises of climate change.

"While we battle a once in a generation pandemic, and with the UK at the helm of the G7 and Cop 26 summits, now is not the time to withdraw funding from a talented pool of researchers who have much to offer the UK and the world.

"Science is at the heart of many of the solutions we desperately need right now. To solve our biggest challenges, the UK government needs to continue to invest in and grow science talent around the globe, not step back from this role."