Villanueva flags DOST’s ‘overlapping’ functions with other gov’t agencies

Senate Majority Leader Joel Villanueva on Friday night raised the “overlapping” functions of the attached agencies of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) with other government offices.

At the Senate plenary deliberations on DOST’s proposed 2024 budget, Villanueva cited several DOST agencies which have similar functions in other departments. Among the examples that he mentioned are:

-DOST’s Philippine Council for Health Research and Development and the Department of Health’s Health Policy Development and Planning Bureau

-DOST’s Food Nutrition Research Institute and DOH’s National Nutrition Council

-DOST’s Philippine Council for Industry Energy and Emerging Technology Development and the Department of Energy’s Energy Research and Testing Laboratory Services.

“Di ko alam kung sino ang nauna, sino ang gumagaya sa isa,” Villanueva quipped.

Senator Francis Tolentino, who defended the budget of the DOST, explained that there might be overlapping functions as the mandate of the then-National Science and Technology Authority’s agencies, which were established through Executive Order No. 128 in 1987, were adopted by newly-created government offices.

“You are correct. It is as if there are overlapping functions...the new ones adopted the earlier functions of the National Science and Technology [Authority],” he said.

Further, Tolentino, citing the statements of DOST Secretary Renato Solidum Jr., explained that the department is in charge of the research and development and the other government entities are supposed to coordinate with them, but their outputs were just being used by the other agencies “to justify perhaps their own existence.”

“There are some outputs, studies produced by the DOST [which are] not being utilized by other government agencies. It’s not a problem of lack of scientific research or data coming from the DOST, but the seeming lack of utilization on the part of other government agencies,” he said.

“Perhaps the rationalization idea could generate a fusion of government outputs that would lead to more cohesive and efficient bureaucracy,” he added.

Villanueva noted that the DOST had already released a study on increasing the harvest and preserving the country’s agricultural products, yet the Department of Agriculture is not implementing such the research's findings. 

The Majority Leader then raised President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.'s task for the Senate to prioritize the bill for the rightsizing of government agencies and asked Solidum’s help in finding the solution to address the supposed overlapping functions of their agencies with other offices.

“Para mas ma-focus natin ‘yung pinaka expertise ng departamentong ito. Doon sila mag focus. At kung merong ibang ahensya o departamento na nakikisawsaw don sa expertise ninyo, we should do something to stop them from pursuing that path that is not their expertise,” Villanueva said.—LDF, GMA Integrated News