Infrastructure impact measures proposed to guide funding

The OECD has published a reference framework for assessment of the economic and social impacts of research infrastructure to help funders and managers get the most out of such facilities.

The framework, published on 28 March, includes a list of indicators and is intended to be a generic and versatile tool for evaluating infrastructures in a realistic way, the report by members of the OECD’s Global Science Forum said.

Infrastructures—such as particle accelerators, telescopes and supercomputers—are indispensable in almost all research fields but are swallowing increasing amounts of investment, Vincent Mangematin, chairman of a GSF expert group on infrastructure, and his co-authors wrote.