Global Research Council in Beijing: Working towards common standards in research and research funding

"Discussions at the third annual meeting of the Global Research Council (GRC) in Beijing, which ended on 28 May 2014, focussed on issues of global interest in research and research funding. At the three-day meeting, top-level representatives of more than 60 research and research funding organisations discussed measures with which to find a common basis for the funding of early career researchers and for free access to scientific publications (open access). Germany was represented at the meeting by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) and its President, Professor Dr. Peter Strohschneider. The GRC is a voluntary, informal union of the heads of research councils from all over the world. It was set up in 2012 in Washington D.C. as part of the "Global Summit on Merit Review" which was organised by the U.S. organisation, the National Science Foundation (NSF). Dr. Subra Suresh, the former Director of the NSF, and Professor Dr. Ing Matthias Kleiner, who was President of the DFG at the time, were instrumental in the GRC's foundation. It represents the majority of public research and research funding bodies which do not receive direct governmental funding and acts to strengthen international collaboration on research and between research funding organisations. Through regular preparatory conferences in different parts of the world and its annual meeting, it offers a forum in which current issues arising from the globalisation and internationalisation of science and research and their funding can be discussed. The outcomes of these discussions are then used to formulate joint recommendations. The organisation of this year's meeting of the GRC was shared by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the National Science Foundation of China (NSFC) and the Canadian Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC). At a formal opening ceremony in the Great Hall of the People, Minister-President Li Keqiang gave a highly regarded speech in which he emphasised the importance of open opportunities for development, of intellectual property and of knowledge-driven research to an effective research system. Plenary sessions took place on the second day in the Sino-German Center for Research Promotion (SGC). This was opened in 2000 by the DFG and the NSFC, a partner organisation of the DFG, and since then has played a significant part in establishing collaborative research ventures between the two countries ..."