Creating a visionary science future fund that could generate more than $2 billion a year for Australia's economy would help offset a mounting social services burden and reverse dangerously low research and development investment, scientists say.
Science and Technology Australia has proposed the fund as a pre-budget submission and a "clever way" for the federal government to implement its election pledge to boost R&D, "getting it closer to the three per cent of GDP achieved in other countries".
The peak body says the initiative could generate up to $2.3 billion in economic returns annually at no future cost to the federal budget after initial capitalisation.
President Mark Hutchinson said it would powerfully advance Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's ambition of an economic future powered by science and Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marle's promise of a "science government".
"Supercharging Australian discovery science would unleash a new golden era of breakthrough discoveries to power our nation's economic development in the decade ahead," Professor Hutchison said.
"By creating an ambitious new science future fund, the government can forge an enduring legacy to put science investments beyond short-term funding cycles."
Prof Hutchison said the fund would match the ambitions of global technological allies and rivals, safeguard national security and sovereign capability, and future-proof local jobs and a more prosperous future.
An astute and agile strategy was urgently needed to drive the transformation, he said.
Analysis shows the fund could inject $650 million every year from investment income into science breakthroughs, generating a massive $2.3 billion in new returns.
Science and Technology Australia CEO Misha Schubert said the United States had embarked upon a program that will supercharge science by $52 billion, something President Joe Biden has called a "once in a generation investment in America itself".
"Australia must be every bit as bold in our ambition to be a global science and technology superpower," she said.
