Highlights
- Congress agreed on a $2.4 billion R&D portfolio in FY 2006 for the
U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), a slight cut of $10 million or
0.4 percent that stands in sharp contrast to a requested 15 percent
cut because of hundreds of millions of dollars in earmarks (see Table).
- Congress
rejects USDA’s proposals to slash formula funds in its extramural research
portfolio, and instead preserves a balance between formula funds, competitive
funds, and earmarks. The final Agriculture appropriations bill keeps
Hatch Act formula funding for land-grant colleges at $177 million, in
contrast to a USDA proposal to eliminate half of this funding and shift
the funds to a new $75 million competitive grants program. The National
Research Initiative (NRI) of competitively awarded research grants increases
slightly to $181 million, well short of a $250 million request. Earmarked
special research grants, however, grow significantly from $120 million
to $127 million.
- USDA intramural R&D falls to $1.3 billion, primarily because of
a drop in R&D facilities construction funding. Congress agrees to the request for $59 million in 2006 to complete the renovation of the National Centers
for Animal Health in Ames, Iowa,
but also adds funds for earmarked research grants and earmarked construction
projects.
- The final USDA
budget keeps USDA R&D near record levels in 2006.
USDA R&D in FY 2006 Final Appropriations
On November 10,
President Bush signed into law the final version of the FY 2006 Agriculture
appropriations bill (HR 2744), which funds most of the U.S. Department
of Agriculture (USDA). USDA’s Forest Service is funded in the Interior
appropriations bill (HR 2361), which was signed into law in August.
The final Defense bill enacted in December contains an across-the-board
cut of 1 percent for all discretionary programs (including USDA), but
also contains emergency appropriations related hurricane disaster relief
and avian flu for several departments, including USDA. In the three
bills, USDA R&D improves
dramatically from a proposed 15 percent cut in the USDA budget request
to a cut of only 0.4 percent for a total of $2.4 billion (see Table).
In a repeat of past years, Congress adds back nearly $300 million in
earmarked funds that were deleted in the request, and also rejects a
USDA proposal to shift formula funds for land-grant institutions to
competitive grants. (For details of the President’s request for USDA
R&D, please see Chapter 11 of AAAS Report XXX: R&D
FY 2006 or the March 3 USDA R&D
Funding Update.)
Instead of USDA’s
proposed move to competitively awarded funds, Congress keeps USDA’s
external portfolio split between formula funds, earmarked funds, and
competitively awarded funds. USDA’s extramural research grants,
nearly entirely to colleges and universities, are administered by the
Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSREES).
Total CSREES R&D declines 1.0 percent to $643 million in FY 2006,
a big improvement from a proposed 20 percent cut. The difference is
that USDA proposed to eliminate $180 million in 2005 congressional earmarks
and slash formula funds, but Congress restores $165 million in earmarked
projects and keeps formula funding stable. Most of these earmarks are
in the nearly entirely earmarked Special Research Grants program, which
USDA proposed to cut from $120 million last year down to just $3 million
in 2006, but the final Agriculture bill provides $125 million for 202
projects, all but 3 of which are for congressionally designated performers.
The remaining 48 earmarks are in other parts of the CSREES budget and
total $40 million.
Congress has rejected USDA’s proposal to dramatically
restructure formula funds for agricultural R&D at land-grant institutions
in 2006. Hatch Act formula funding for agricultural R&D at land-grant
colleges remains at $177 million (down 1.0 percent because of the across-the-board
cut) instead of the USDA proposal to cut it in half to $89 million in
the first year of a two-year phaseout. Congress
also rejects similar proposed cuts to other formula research grants
(in “All Other CSREES R&D” in the Table), at the same time rejecting
USDA’s proposed alternative to formula funds, a new $75 million competitive
research grants program just for land-grant institutions.
The National Research Initiative (NRI) of competitively awarded, extramural
research grants receives $181 million, a modest increase compared to
the $250 million request. But there would be a transfer of some
competitive grants currently funded in Integrated Grants to NRI, leaving
actual program funding slightly below last year’s level. USDA also proposed
to make competitive grants more attractive to potential applicants by
repealing a longstanding limit on indirect cost reimbursements for USDA
grants, currently capped at 20 percent, but the final Agriculture bill
keeps the 20 percent limit in place.
Over the years,
CSREES has awarded its R&D funds through earmarks, formula funds,
and competitive grants roughly equally at about a third of the portfolio
each with formula funds in the lead, but the FY 2006 request proposed
to shake up this system by eliminating earmarks and phasing out formula
funds over two years. Although every USDA budget request proposes to
eliminate earmarks, this was the first time USDA had also proposed to
phase out formula funds. Reaction among the land-grant universities
receiving formula funds was largely negative. After much lobbying on
the merits of formula funding to sustain a geographically dispersed
and locally responsive nationwide agricultural research infrastructure,
Congress restores the traditional balance in FY 2006. But USDA may try
again in the FY 2007 budget request next February.
Figure 1. (click on the image for PDF)
Most of USDA’s intramural
research is performed in the Agricultural Research Service (ARS). ARS R&D falls 1.4 percent or $19
million to $1.3 billion, an improvement over steep requested cuts because of
millions of dollars in added earmarks and $16 million in emergency
appropriations to combat avian flu. The appropriation includes the $59
million request for the National Centers for Animal Health in Ames,
Iowa. Congress provided $122 million for
the Ames facility in the FY 2005
budget, and the FY 2006 appropriation should be sufficient to finish the major
renovation project. The renovated National Centers for Animal Health will serve
as the nation’s premier animal research and diagnostic laboratory and will
enhance the nation’s ability to respond to attacks on the food supply as a biosafety level 3 (BSL-3) facility.
Congress also provides $71 million in unrequested
construction funds for earmarked projects at ARS laboratories around the country,
roughly the same amount as last year. The drop in total construction funding
allows for a 3.4 percent boost to the intramural ARS research budget to $1.1
billion, with much of the $139 million boost over the request in the form of
earmarked research projects at ARS laboratories as well as a last-minute
infusion of funds for avian flu preparedness.
The other major
USDA R&D agency is the Forest Service; the final FY 2006 appropriation
for its R&D is $326 million, up 3.7 percent or $12 million from
last year. Although the primary focus of its R&D portfolio is forestry
and ecosystems research, in recent years the Forest Service has emphasized
its fire science and wildfire management research portfolio as well.
Most of this research is performed in intramural laboratories, although
there is also an extramural fire science grants program that receives
$23 million in 2006.
Figure 2. (click on the image for PDF)
The final Agriculture
appropriations bill contains several legislative provisions affecting USDA
research, but leaves out a Senate-approved provision that could have curtailed
animal research and other research. In addition to the provision keeping a USDA
cap on indirect costs at 20 percent, the bill also continues to block the
availability of mandatory research funds in the Initiative for Future
Agriculture and Food Systems (IFAFS) but allows 22 percent of NRI funds to go
to IFAFS-like projects. A Senate-approved provision designed to restrict
colleges, universities and research institutions from purchasing laboratory
animals from some suppliers failed to make it into the final bill; scientific
organizations (including AAAS) and research universities had opposed the
provision because it would have cut off all USDA funds from institutions
running afoul of the provision, even for research programs in unrelated areas.
Impacts of the USDA R&D Portfolio
The slightly declining FY 2006 USDA R&D portfolio keeps the department’s
R&D funding near record highs in inflation-adjusted dollars
(see Figure 1). USDA R&D has been at historical highs this decade.
Since hitting a recent low in FY 1996, the funding trend has been generally
upward, first because the federal budget surplus made more discretionary
funds available to congressional appropriators, then in FY 2000 and
FY 2001 from the release of mandatory competitive research funds, and
since FY 2002 because heightened concern about agricultural terrorism
and the security of USDA laboratories resulted in millions for security
upgrades and other homeland security-related investments. But with homeland
security-related construction needs waning at locations such as Ames,
the FY 2006 budget brings USDA R&D down from record levels.
Although NRI stays
near historical highs in 2006, the history of competitive agricultural
research grants has been mixed in recent years as Congress and USDA
have blocked mandatory competitive programs, directed the bulk of recent
increases to facilities rather than research, siphoned off NRI dollars
to fund earmarks, and repeatedly fallen short of the original vision
of NRI as a $500 million-a-year program. Late last year, there was a
push to create a National Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA)
employing an extramural, peer-reviewed basic research model for agricultural
research like the National Institutes of Health (NIH); advocates hoped
that a NIFA existing as a semi-independent agency within USDA would
offer a higher profile for basic agricultural research and perhaps higher
dollars. The NIFA proposal did not make it into the FY 2006 budget request
or final budget, and the request for a $250 million NRI failed to gain
traction in Congress.
USDA is the sixth-largest
supporter of R&D in the federal government, and its support is especially
important for key disciplines. USDA is responsible for just 5 percent
of all research support in the broad area of the life sciences, but
dominates funding for two disciplines within life sciences, agricultural
sciences and environmental biology. USDA funds more than 90 percent
of all federal support for the agricultural sciences, with the remainder
supported by the Agency for International Development (for international
agriculture R&D) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(for aquaculture and other marine-related R&D). USDA is also an
important supporter of chemistry and biology, and represents a majority
of federal support for economics through the Economic Research Service
(ERS).
Recent increases
in USDA R&D have boosted USDA support of research (see Figure 2),
with most of the increases going to the life sciences. USDA support
of other disciplines has declined steadily over the years and will likely
decline even further when the FY 2005 and 2006 budgets are distributed.
USDA’s R&D portfolio is the most evenly distributed geographically
among federal R&D funding agencies. 73 percent of USDA’s R&D
goes to its own laboratories in a nationwide network of agricultural
experiment stations located in all 50 states. Another 25 percent of
the portfolio goes to colleges and universities, again to all 50 states
because of the nationwide network of land-grant colleges and minority
serving institutions that often receive USDA funds through formula distributions
and geographically dispersed R&D earmarks. The top 10 state recipients
of USDA R&D funds account for less than half the USDA total (see
Figure 3), in contrast to the overall federal R&D portfolio in which
just 7 states receive the majority of federal R&D.
Figure 3. (click on the image for PDF)
-
December 28, 2005
(This analysis is one of a series of AAAS R&D Funding
Updates on FY 2006 congressional appropriations. The complete series
of AAAS R&D Funding Updates, including continually updated analyses
of R&D in FY 2006 appropriations, is available on the AAAS
R&D Web Site (http://www.aaas.org/spp/rd) in the "FY
2006 R&D" or the "What's New"
sections.)
AAAS R&D Budget and Policy Program
1200 New York Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 326-6607; -6600
AAAS R&D
Web site: www.aaas.org/spp/rd
