UN told it should re-establish science board

National science advisers are expected to call on the UN to reinstate its Scientific Advisory Board under a new structure after it was quietly shelved in September.

The UN should establish a board to link up national and global science advisers, a draft manifesto by the International Network for Government Science Advice will say. The document, which outlines Ingsa’s aims and policies for 2030, is expected to be published at about 8pm GMT on 10 November.

“You will see in the manifesto a very specific recommendation that a proper science advisory board is set up for the UN,” Peter Gluckman, the chief scientific adviser to New Zealand’s prime minister and chairman of Ingsa, told Research Europe.

The board could have several functions, but “most importantly it should create a vertical linkage between global science advisory mechanisms and domestic ones”, Gluckman said.

“There’s absolutely no linkage at all at present,” Gluckman said. In the eight-and-a-half years that Gluckman has been New Zealand's chief scientific adviser, “the UN system never contacted me once,” he said, except when he was invited to speak to the UN Environment Programme in 2016.

Research Europe reported that the Scientific Advisory Board, which was introduced by former UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon in 2013, was shut down in September after almost a year of inactivity. A spokesman for UN secretary-general António Guterres said that he wanted to set up a new board that reflects his priorities. The decision provoked a mixed reaction from members of the board, who had not been officially informed of the decision.

The decision has left a “void” in scientific advice to the UN, Gluckman said. He urged the UN to take this opportunity to correct the “structural defects” in the system. The new board should be able to connect the UN’s multiple sources of expert advice and provide oversight for planning on how to meet the Sustainable Development Goals, he said.

The old board “just wasn’t the right mandate for what is now needed, with science being so core to the SDG process,” Gluckman said.

The new board’s membership should be comprised of top researchers with a vision for sustainable development, according to the Ingsa manifesto seen by Research Europe. It will recommend that members should have a clear vision for incorporating science and innovation in the UN’s sustainability agenda for 2030.

The board should also help the UN secretary-general with science diplomacy and encourage the development of domestic scientific advice mechanisms, the manifesto will say. “As important as the UN system is, it is even more important that every country has some form of science advisory ecosystem,” Gluckman said. He said that many African countries don't yet have scientific academies. 

Gluckman and Heide Hackmann, an executive director of the International Council for Science, have written to Guterres with their proposal for a new UN board. Ingsa will invite feedback on the recommendations in its draft manifesto until 10 January, and a final version will be published in the spring.