HURDLES BETWEEN HIGH HOPES: ADVERSITIES IN SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS IN THE PHILIPPINES

There’s no deeper well of curiosity than a child’s young mind. Accompany them for a few minutes, and your ears will be ringing with the meddlesome questions they bombard you with. “Ate, ate, ano po ito?” “Kuya, kuya, bakit ganito?”

For Reinabelle Reyes, a Filipina astrophysicist and data scientist, her curiosity as a child about black holes and everything cosmic was what drove her towards her now successful science career. “That’s really what motivates us- we want to understand the world, learn something new, and share it with others.” (CNN Philippines, 2020)

The weight of the work

According to an interview by AsianScientist in 2016, Ms. Reyes is proudest of her contributions in the project ReliefOps.Ph. This project aimed to provide data and analysis in order to increase efficiency in the allocation of relief goods (Ateneo de Manila University, 2015). This project was a significant step in improving disaster management in the country.

Science research, like what Ms. Reyes has been doing, is truly what progresses a country. Farmers can spend less time under the scorching heat because of advances in agricultural technology. Every day, more people are able to run back to the warm embraces of their family because of the progress in the medical field. Because scientists like Ms. Reyes willingly go the extra mile in the name of science, lives are not only improved but also saved.

Since time immemorial, the human race has only been moving forward, from the discovery of fire, the creation of tools, and now, a vaccine for a recent pandemic. It has really been a rollercoaster. Every day, people still make significant progress in all different fields of science. In a way, research is a time-traveling machine, allowing people to go back to their ever-curious and meddlesome little selves.

Pickles in our progress

Imagine being a curious scientist since childhood. Imagine wanting to find out as much as you can about the world and wanting to make as big of a difference as you can, only for your potential to remain untouched.

What good is a country without scientific progress? All successful nations build their policies around science research and technology. The goal of research, after all, is to solve problems. In the Philippines, however, it seems as if the government’s priority is seldom directed towards research and development.

In the AsianScientist interview, Ms. Reyes expressed the adversities facing the research community in the Philippines, calling out the lack of resources allocated for research.

Costly complications

One of the hurdles that Ms. Reyes identified is research funding, along with time, infrastructure, and personnel constraints. Even in small-scale school projects, we’re all made well-aware of the costliness of research. With the equipment, the subjects, and the testing, it’s no surprise that our wallets are soon left as light as a feather.

To make matters worse, the budget allocated for the Department of Science and Technology for 2021 was cut by P76 million. (CNN Philippines, 2020). Naturally, with the decrease in the already-measly budget for research and development, we can also count on a decrease in the quality of the progress that we will make.

In this time of the pandemic, health policies, testing measures, and treatment development should be the priority. Yet, the actions taken are quite the opposite of what Jaime C. Montoya, president of the National Research Council of the Philippines, recommended. In an interview by SciDev.net (2010), Montoya stated that half of the government’s budget for research and development, a big jump from the 20% budget then, should go towards basic research.

Since before, scientists have advocated for better allocation of resources for research and development in the country. Truly, our country may have come a long way, but we have an even longer way to go. The road towards maximizing the potential of our scientists and our scientific progress is not a smooth one.

The task of strengthening science progress is a responsibility given not only to researchers, but to all of us. As we continue advocating for the prioritization of scientific development, Ms. Reyes provides us with these words of hope. “It is unfortunate how much potential is not being fulfilled; on the flip-side, one can imagine what we can collectively be capable of, given the means.” (AsianScientist, 2016)