The Federal Ministry of Research's FONA Strategy: On the Right Track, but Innovation Must Be Considered More Broadly
Yesterday in Berlin, Federal Minister of Research Dorothee Bär presented her ministry’s new funding strategy, “Research for Sustainability” (Orig. „Forschung für Nachhaltigkeit (FONA)“). The Ecological Research Network (Ecornet) – a network of eight leading sustainability research institutes in Germany – welcomes the high priority that the minister herself and the Federal Ministry of Research, Technology, and Space (BMFTR) place on research into sustainability and economic transformation, as well as the ministry’s intention to increasingly fund interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research addressing major societal challenges. To implement the strategy, the institutes propose a broader understanding of innovation, impact, and knowledge transfer, and recommend paying even greater attention to the social dimension of sustainability.
Ministry Wants to Increase Funding for Inter- and Transdisciplinary Research on Societal Challenges
“We must do everything in our power to ensure that the issue of sustainability is not pushed to the back burner,” said the minister in light of growing anti-science sentiment and climate change denial. In her speech, she also wanted the newly released FONA strategy to be understood as a “clear signal” that this should not happen. Sustainability, the minister continued, is active planning for the future and also a decisive economic factor.
“The new FONA strategy emphasizes inter- and transdisciplinarity as a successful approach to researching the major challenges of our time, such as the climate crisis, loss of biodiversity, resource scarcity, and societal change,” says Flurina Schneider, co-spokesperson for Ecornet and scientific director of the Institute for Social-Ecological Research (ISOE). The current strategy also places greater emphasis than before on issues of implementation and scaling.
“The transdisciplinary research approach opens up new perspectives on societal problems. Collaboration between science, politics, business, and civil society also strengthens sustainable solutions and improves the translation of research findings into practice. For us, co-creation and real-world laboratories are not merely methodological add-ons, but rather at the core of our scientific identity,” says Schneider.
Ecornet: Effective Research Requires a Broad Understanding of Innovation with a Social Dimension
The Ecornet network views the FONA strategy’s strong focus on societal impacts and the implementation of results in societal and business practice positively. Compared to its predecessor programs, the strategy stands out for its stronger technology orientation and a new focus on the implementation of technological innovations by companies. “However, in order to provide society with the best and most promising solutions that have high implementation potential, a broad understanding of innovation and impact is necessary,” says Thomas Korbun, co-spokesperson for Ecornet and Scientific Director of the Institute for Ecological Economic Research (IÖW).
Sustainability research institutes see room for improvement in this area. For example, the FONA strategy focuses very heavily on technological innovations and value creation. However, sustainability problems are rarely purely technical in nature; rather, they are usually closely linked to social practices, institutional frameworks, and issues of equity.
The Ministry should place greater emphasis on the interdependence of technological innovations with social innovations and behavioral changes. This applies even to the early phases of technology development and should therefore be taken into account from the outset when formulating concrete funding initiatives under the strategy. Only in this way can sustainable results be achieved that can be effectively implemented.
According to the Ecornet Institutes, issues of social sustainability have so far received insufficient attention in the FONA strategy. Topics such as labor, health, demographic change, and issues of equity and distribution are closely linked to ecological and technological issues. Sustainable economic prosperity and quality of life in society can only be achieved if technology development is linked to the ecological and social dimensions of sustainability. “If the FONA strategy is to fully realize its potential impact, it should therefore anchor social sustainability and distributional issues even more firmly as an integral part of innovation processes – especially in the early phases of innovation development,” says Korbun.
Consistently Align FONA with the Requirements of a Socio-Ecological Transformation
Ecornet also advocates transforming FONA into forward-looking and reliable funding models. Research funding must be consistently aligned with the requirements of a socio-ecological transformation. Well-funded, long-term funding programs and agile, low-bureaucracy funding structures are essential. To ensure high-quality research results and a high degree of practical implementation, the quality of the submitted project proposals must remain the most important selection criterion.
From Ecornet’s perspective, the integration of the FONA strategy with the German High-Tech Agenda has been successful. The Ecornet institutes recommend that the High-Tech Agenda learn from the identified strengths of the FONA strategy and be developed further in a sustainable manner. Ecornet welcomes the fact that FONA has been conceived by the Ministry of Research as a “learning strategy.” From the network’s perspective, this aspiration must be consistently put into practice. Unlike its initial development – which took place without stakeholder participation – the strategy’s further development should be participatory and involve broad engagement with stakeholders from the scientific community, the business sector, and civil society. The Ecornet institutes will contribute their expertise to the further development of the FONA strategy and the High-Tech Agenda.
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About Ecornet
At Ecornet, more than 1,000 staff members across eight institutes work on concrete proposals for pathways toward ecologically sustainable and socially just futures. Our work on socio-ecological transformations is always linked to visions of a democratic, vibrant society. Through our research and our transdisciplinary research approach, we actively contribute to the democratic shaping of the necessary transformations. Ecornet members include: Ecologic Institute, ifeu – Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, Institute for Ecological Economy Research (IÖW), Institute for Social-Ecological Research (ISOE), IZT – Institute for Future Studies and Technology Assessment, Öko-Institut, Independent Institute for Environmental Issues (UfU), Wuppertal Institute.
