The National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN, ) is a cabinet-level agency of the Indonesian government, formed in 2019. Originally a new agency attached to the Ministry of Research and Technology, which became the Ministry of Research and Technology/National Research and Innovation Agency, the agency was controversially separated and established as a new non-ministerial government agency directly under the President of Indonesia on 28 April 2021. On 23 August 2021, the agency gained cabinet-level status through enactment of Presidential Decree No. 78/2021. Under the new presidential regulation, it became the sole national research agency of Indonesia.
The agency has been characterized as a "scientific merger company" for its controversial strategy of subsuming many pre-existing scientific agencies. Aswismarmo, an Indonesian scholar and historian, noted that BRIN is a form of "holding research institution". Former BRIN chairman Laksana Tri Handoko claimed that the agency is a "Research Mothership" that houses all the state research activities of Indonesia.
In September 2021, BRIN became a member of the International Science Council.
History
Formation On 17 April 2018, President Joko Widodo signed Presidential Decree No. 38/2018 regarding the National Research Main Framework of 2017–2045. The decree was intended to outline national research policies and priorities for sustainable development.
Before BRIN existed, government research and development activities were scattered throughout various ministries and government institutes and were mostly pursuing short term outcomes. Research and development management was also considered ineffective. In 2018, the Corruption Eradication Commission reported that, of national government funding of around 24.92 trillion rupiahs allocated for research (0.25% of Indonesia's GDP), only 43.74% was spent on research and development activities, while the rest went on operational costs (30.68%), service costs (13.17%), capital expenditure (6.65%), and education and training (5.77%). Fictitious research, overlapping research, and misuse and mismanagement of funding was also reported. BRIN was formed with the intent to fix these problems.
In January 2019, BRIN's formation was suggested by former president Megawati Soekarnoputri, leader of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, in a speech to mark her party's 46th anniversary. She suggested a research and innovation agency to direct and support the national research ecosystem, to promote national self-sufficiency.
On 13 August 2019, Widodo signed Law No. 11 of 2019 concerning the National System of Sciences and Technology, which included an article laying the foundation for BRIN. After winning the election on 23 October 2019, it was announced that BRIN would be attached to the Ministry of Research and Technology. On 24 October 2019, a temporary constituting document was signed, specifying that the organization of BRIN must be fixed within three months.
Bambang Brodjonegoro, the Minister of Research and Technology, failed to set the structure of BRIN by the deadline; an extension was issued to 30 April 2020. This deadline was also missed, creating uncertainty for Indonesian researchers.
The uncertainty was due to conflicts between three ministries: the Ministry of Research and Technology, the Ministry of Law and Human Rights, and the Ministry of State Apparatus Utilization and Bureaucratic Reform. The People's Representative Council requested Widodo to warn the ministries to work together and consolidate their efforts.
Following a restructuring of the ministries in April 2021, BRIN was made a new, separate, non-ministerial agency. Laksana Tri Handoko, the former Chief of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences, was appointed as its chairman.
Establishment as Indonesia's sole National Research Agency On 5 May 2021, Widodo signed a new decree which effectively established BRIN as the sole national research agency; all other research agencies—such as the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), the (BPPT), the (BATAN), and the National Institute of Aeronautics and Space (LAPAN)—would be subsumed into BRIN. Regulatory functions remained with the ministry. The decree was not published on the government's official law channel until 29 May 2021, although it had already become known through the media.
The organizational structure of BRIN was greatly expanded by this decree. It was divided into a steering committee and executive. The steering committee's members are, ex-officio, the members of the steering committee of the Pancasila Ideology Development Agency (BPIP); and the chairman of the BPIP steering committee is also chairman of the BRIN steering committee. The executive oversees research and day-to-day activities, as directed by the steering committee, and is headed by the chairman.
The decree also enabled the research and development departments of provincial and city governments to become part of the Regional Research and Innovation Agency () (BRIDA). While BRIDA offices would be responsive to local governments, BRIN would have the power to monitor, control, and evaluate the research in each BRIDA office. The decree mandated the government of every province, regency and township to form its own BRIDA office within 2 years. With 34 provinces, 416 regencies, and 98 townships, 548 BRIDA offices were therefore expected to be formed.
The government allocated Rp 6.6 trillion to fund BRIN in 2022. This funding was later increased to Rp 10.51 trillion.
On 20 September 2021, it was revealed that more than 11,000 employees of the former Ministry of Research and Technology, LIPI, BPPT, LAPAN, and BATAN were being moved from their original institutions to BRIN.
BRIN's research and development consolidation plans On 9 June 2021, the chairman of BRIN, Laksana Tri Handoko, announced a plan for BRIN to expand and integrate with ministerial research and development (R&D) divisions. The plan dated back to 2018, when parliament had discussed the Law of National System of Sciences and Technology. In April 2021, President Widodo intended that in the future, the work of national R&D activities would be consolidated within BRIN, to preclude overlapping research efforts. In announcing this plan, BRIN, together with the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of National Development Planning, prepared 3 options: (1) full integration of ministerial R&D divisions into BRIN, with each ministry fully relinquishing their R&D responsibilities; this plan was the most radical, given the required structural changes, which would be overseen by Ministry of State Apparatus Utilization and Bureaucratic Reform; (2) program transition, with only some of the funding and execution of ministerial R&D programs being relinquished to BRIN; or (3) partial transition, by which only part of the research arms within the ministerial R&D divisions would be relinquished to BRIN, with the staff retaining their place within their originating ministries. The third option was probably offered due to some ministries having their R&D divisions being combined with those concerned with human resources development, such as in the Ministry of Religious Affairs' Research, Development, Education, and Training Agency.
To strengthen BRIN's ability to coordinate all national research with those at the regional and local levels, on 22 July 2021 the Ministry of State Apparatus Utilization and Bureaucratic Reform issued Circular No. B/295/M.SM.02.03/2021 on the reformation and transformation of research resources. The circular was addressed to all state-owned research institutions and regional and local research and development departments, and it mandated that those institutes coordinate their research and development under BRIN, and pushed for the formation of BRIDA offices by no later than 31 December 2022. On 12 August 2021, the Ministry of Home Affairs' Research and Development Agency—along with the Ministry of State Apparatus Utilization and Bureaucratic Reform, BRIN, the National Civil Service Agency, and the National Institute of Public Administration—held a symposium on Research Institution Reformation, where issues relating to research coordination under BRIN were discussed. The issues were: (1) the transfer of human resource from the institutions that were to be subsumed into BRIN, and (2) the difficulties involved in the formation of BRIDA. On the formation of BRIDA, the Ministry of Home Affairs offered its assistance to the regional and local governments in establishing their BRIDA offices.
On 28 August 2021, BRIN, announced plans to cut off and dismantle redundant state research institutions and centers of excellence (COEs) in Indonesia to achieve efficiency in funding. BRIN also developed means to prevent the formation of such institutions in the future, to avoid redundant and needlessly costly research efforts.
On 22 September 2021, the Eijkman Institute for Molecular Biology, a long-time subordinate agency of the Ministry of Research and Technology, officially become subordinate to BRIN. It was announced that it had become a "research unit under the BRIN". The name of the Eijkman Institute was later changed to the Eijkman Molecular Biology Research Center, under the Life Sciences Research Organization of the National Research and Innovation Agency. This was the first BRIN organizational capture after the consolidation.
On 24 January 2022, BRIN announced that eventually 919 state research units from 74 ministries and non-ministerial research arms would be consolidated under the BRIN umbrella. These units would be consolidated to form 104 research centers scattered across 18 research organizations. 12 research organizations would be inaugurated on 1 February 2022 as the first batch of 2022 consolidations.
Structural revision Presidential Decree No. 33/2021 clashed with existing laws, and scientists and lawmakers called for a revision of the constituting document. The biggest issues were clashes between Law No. 10/1997 (Nuclear Power) and Law No. 21/2013 (Law of Space), by which BATAN and LAPAN, respectively, were created, not through Presidential Decrees, such as created LIPI, BPPT, and other agencies. On 7 July 2021, the government announced that the presidential decree No. 33/2021 would be superseded and thus change BRIN's operation and structure. The replacement document was still being drafted at the time of the announcement, which did give a glimpse of the future changes. The announcement outlined 5 major points of revision: (1) Changes to the presidential decree's articles that conflicted with preexisting laws; (2) Clarification of the integration mechanisms; (3) Harmonization between BRIN and other scientific and scientific regulatory agencies; (4) Fixing inter-agency coordination issues; (5) Setting up 10 to 11 Technical Implementing Organizations under BRIN. What Technical Implementing Organizations would be subordinated under BRIN was unknown at the time, but there would be some demotions of currently preexisting organizations, and some others would be split off from preexisting organizations. The revision also defended BATAN and LAPAN being dismantled, although some parts of those institutions would join BRIN. Despite that, the said revision planned to clarify the differences between BRIN and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology in regulating science in Indonesia. The coordination between these two institutions on research matters with the House of Representatives (DPR) are yet to be made clear. As a result, currently consultation on research matters is split between two different commissions of the DPR.