Wellington
The government may have signaled that the Crown Research Institutes aren’t as obliged as theyhave been in the past to fire ‘profits’ back to their owner, but that shouldn’t stop NewZealand checking out how well they’ve performed in the past year.
With all the CRI’s annual reports showing up at once, it can be difficult to have a handle onwhat their performance has been.
A breakdown of the reports, along with selected highlights of the CRIs consider that they'redelivering, show a research sector looking to engage more with its core customers and clients.
As usual all the CRIs reported in different ways, highlighting areas they consideredsignificant.
Scion
Before-tax profit of $3.240m, but a one-off tax adjustment of $3.170mmeant a net loss of $0.978m for the year. Four goals:
•Increase the value and profitabilityof NZ’s forests
•Optimise the value of marginal land
•Accelerate development ofbioproducts from renewable resources
•Maximise the quality and impact of Scion’sscience
AgResearch
Surplus before tax of $2m, but one-off removal of taxdepreciation on buildings required an $11m adjustment, for a net loss after tax of -$9m. It isconcentrating on five major areas of opportunity:
•Help create the future dairy industry
•Help create the future meat industries
•Help create the future textiles andbiomaterials industries
•Help achieve a pest and disease-free NZ
•Enable capacityfor change in agriculture and its future communities
Plant & Food Research
Operating profit of $5.544m, impairment of profitand one-off adjustments resulted in net loss of $5.683m. Concentrating its efforts on:
•Better cultivars faster
•Residue-free pest and disease control
•Moresustainable and profitable systems
•Proprietary foods with price premiums
Institute of Environmental Science and Research
Profit before tax of$4.501m, adjustments due to tax changes resulted in net loss of $0.518m. Provides science advice andservices to government agencies, local authorities and the private sector, with core initiativesin:
•Intelligent systems
•Forensic
•Environmental health
•Socialscience
Landcare Research
Surplus before tax of $2.905m, adjustments due todepreciation changes resulted in net loss of $1.323m. Core expertise in:
•Biosystematics andnationally significant biological collections
•Terrestrial and freshwater ecosystemprocesses
•National vegetation monitoring systems
•Environmental assessments andmanagement
•Infomatics and integrative modeling capability
•Policy advice andevaluation
Industrial Research Ltd.
Surplus before tax of $2.158m, adjustments forbuilding depreciation resulted in a net surplus after tax of $0.168m. During the year brought itsseven science groups under three clusters:
•Advanced manufacturing technologies – energyand materials group, engineering and applied physics group, high temperature superconductorsgroup
•Industrial biotechnologies – carbohydrate chemistry group, GlycoSyn, integratedbioactive technologies group
•Measurement standards laboratory
GNS Science
Profit before tax of $2.384m, profit after tax of $1.048m. Cameup with 50 specific ways it delivers benefits to NZ, which can be summarised as:
•Securityand wealth from energy, mineral and water resources
•Mitigation of the economic and socialeffects of geological hazards
•Development of new technologies such as nano-scale devicesand non-invasive scanning
NIWA
Earnings before interest and tax of $9.5m, depreciation changesresulted in net surplus after tax of $4.5m. Generates economic benefit for NZ through:
•Using its knowledge to help others derive economic benefit from the efficient and effectiveuse of NZ’s natural resources and infrastructure
•Providing solutions that reduce oreliminate risks from natural or human-induced environmental impacts on economic activities
•Conducting technical and market assessments of business opportunities arising from itsscience, so that investment risk is better understood
•Being open to joint ventures with theprivate sector where this encourages start-up of new economic activity
•Workingcollaboratively with other parts of government to ensure that first adopters are appropriatelysupported and that government investment is aligned and effective