President Lee Jae Myung speaks at the first full session of the Presidential Advisory Council on Science & Technology at the presidential office in Yongsan, central Seoul, on Aug. 22. [JOINT PRESS CORPS]
The government set next year’s national research and development (R&D) budget at 35.3 trillion won ($25.3 billion), a 19.3 percent increase from this year and the largest allocation ever, in the first such proposal under President Lee Jae Myung’s administration.
The Ministry of Science and ICT confirmed the plan at a full session of the Presidential Advisory Council on Science & Technology on Friday.
The proposal emphasizes securing future technologies and restoring the research ecosystem, with heavy investment in five key sectors: artificial intelligence, energy, strategic technologies, defense and small and venture businesses.
AI will see the steepest rise. The government more than doubled its budget for the field from 1.1 trillion won this year to 2.3 trillion won in 2026. Funding will target advanced projects such as artificial general intelligence (AGI) and lightweight, low-power AI models.
R&D for national strategic technologies — including quantum computing and synthetic biology — will rise 29.9 percent to 8.5 trillion won. The budgets for energy, defense and small and venture businesses will also expand by 19.1 percent, 25.3 percent and 39.3 percent, respectively.
To support recovery in the research ecosystem, the government increased funding for basic research by 14.6 percent, talent development by 35 percent, government-funded research institutes by 17.1 percent, regional growth by 54.8 percent and disaster safety by 14.2 percent.
Officials also decided to phase out the long-debated Project-Based System (PBS), introduced in 1996, which has long been criticized as the main obstacle preventing government-funded researchers from pursuing large projects.
The system required researchers at state-run institutes to cover salaries and costs through outside project grants. While it encouraged competition, it often forced researchers to focus on winning contracts instead of pursuing long-term innovation.
The science community welcomed the move after backlash over steep R&D budget cuts made by the former administration last year, which trimmed spending by nearly 10 percent in a single year. Though the government restored funding to previous levels this year, the episode left what officials described as lingering disruption in the field.
“This R&D budget is not just about restoring the ecosystem but about achieving full recovery and real growth,” Minister of Science and ICT Baek Kyung-hoon said.
“We will work with the science and technology community to establish a sustainable research system that is stable and predictable.”
The R&D budget proposal will next go through the government’s budget drafting process before being submitted to the National Assembly for review and approval.
This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
BY KANG KWANG-WOO [[email protected]]
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