The Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, part of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, has announced plans to make changes to its Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research program, the largest competitive grant program in the country. The Grants-in-Aid program is dedicated to innovations and progress in science research, and the last time changes were made to the program was 50 years ago. The changes are expected to be implemented in the next round of grants this September, and were made to salvage Japan from its falling position as one of the global leaders in science.

Between 2005 and 2015, Japan’s share of published articles dropped 38.1% to 5%, as has its global share of research papers, which dropped 1% to 6% in 2016. The decreases in contributions are largely related to the government’s flat budget for R&D, which has remained at approximately ¥3.5 trillion ($30 billion) for the past 16 years.

Changes to the program include creating new scientific field categories to limit competition between fields; reforming the overly specialized grant categories so researchers have more control over their projects; reducing panel numbers from 500 to about 375 to ensure focus on proposals instead of the fields of study; and the merging of a medium-sized grant category for researchers at the start of their careers with other categories. Additionally, a special grant category created for grants up to ¥500 million ($4.4 million) will be capped at one grant per applicant in order to be accessible to more researchers.

Source: Nature Index