[2022 National Audit] Universities Squander National R&D Funds on 'Administrative Expenses'

Assemblyman Park Wanju pointed out during the Science and ICT Committee's audit on the 4th

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Bong-su] It has been pointed out that domestic universities are using a significant portion of the national research and development (R&D) project funds for unrelated purposes under the name of 'management fees' after securing them.

Park Wan-joo, a member of the National Assembly's Science, Technology, Information and Broadcasting and Communications Committee (Chungnam Cheonan, 3rd term), issued a press release on the 4th ahead of the Ministry of Science and ICT's audit, stating, "The excessive size of indirect costs for research management and supervision during the execution of national R&D projects and the transfer of funds to university accounting that do not match their intended use are greatly weakening universities' research capabilities."

According to Article 13 of the 'National Research and Development Innovation Act' enacted in May 2020, the research and development expenses for national research projects are calculated by combining direct costs, which can be directly derived from the research project, and indirect costs, which are generally commonly used during the execution of research and development projects. The usage is regulated by presidential decree. Excluding indirect costs paid to institutions such as personnel expenses for research support staff, facility operation expenses, and performance promotion expenses, the remaining direct costs are the actual research funds spent on researcher salaries, student wages, and research and development expenses.

The problem is that last year, the average indirect cost for national research and development projects at 159 domestic universities reached a staggering 25.5%, and the average indirect cost for basic research projects was also 18%, with approximately 1.261 trillion KRW paid to industry-academic cooperation foundations over the past five years. It was also confirmed that some of the indirect costs were transferred to university accounting. According to data submitted by the Ministry of Education to Park’s office, about 130 billion KRW of indirect costs from national research and development projects at 342 universities in 2021 were transferred to university accounting. Since research and development expenses as well as salaries for researchers and student researchers in master's and doctoral programs must be paid from the direct costs remaining after excluding indirect costs including university accounting transfers, this issue is directly related to improving researcher treatment and human resource development.

Park stated, "Although South Korea's national R&D budget relative to GDP ranks first in the world, its research competitiveness has remained at 8th place for two consecutive years," and argued, "It is necessary to solidify the system so that the increased indirect costs proportional to the scale of national R&D are managed more systematically and contribute to producing research outcomes." He also emphasized, "Since universities are places where education and research are mixed, a verification system must be established to ensure that funds transferred to university accounting are used according to the original purpose of research."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.