Written question WQ84987

Last November we published our five priorities for Research and Innovation, which included the development of a cross Government Innovation Strategy.

The five priorities are to:

• Ensure Wales has a fair share of available research, development and innovation funding and we will work to secure funding levels at least equivalent to those we received historically, via the European Union. We will also work to address historic underfunding from both competitive and non-competitive UK investment sources.

• Deploy research, development and innovation capacity to support our Programme for Government focus on climate change, environmental recovery and decarbonisation, including support for local government decarbonisation plans.

• Build our research, development and innovation capacity in health and life sciences while ensuring Wales is a full partner in delivering the UK Life Sciences Vision.

• Develop a new cross-Welsh Government innovation strategy, with a particular focus on driving impact.

• Continue to grow Wales’ capacity for excellent research by launching the next phase of Sêr Cymru.

An extensive consultation exercise on the innovation strategy is underway and publication is planned for the Autumn.