On 9 June 2023, the NRI Council handed over the Organizational Restructure Plan to the Salaries and Conditions Monitoring Committee consistent with Public Service Management Act and General Orders 2 and the SCMC Act.
The Organizational Restructure is seeking SCMC to approve the existing 82 positions plus 25 new positions that should all be funded to implement the NRI Corporate Plan and NRI Strategic Plan 2021-2030 that are designed to diversify the Institutes research activities to provide evidence based data and information to contribute to the development of public policies and decision-making processes that will improve service delivery, leading to better quality of life for all Papua New Guineans.
The NRI structure approved in 2000 has 82 positions but over the last 20 years, many positions were not funded by Treasury with only 43 positions on strength and with underfunding, NRI could manage with 33 staff, with only 7 researchers trying to cover 8 Research Divisions.
The NRI Act 1975, gives the NRI Council the authority to engage its manpower requirements by appointing its own staff, engage consultants within budget or engage officers and employees of other departments and government bodies in consultation with the Department of Personnel Management.
To address the shortage of researchers at NRI, the DPM has endorsed for NRI to seek specialist research staff on work attachment and secondment from within the public service and disciplinary forces to NRI until such time we have fully funded and established manpower strength.
On 11 June 2021, NRI Council launched its 2021-2023 Corporate Plan and 2021-2030 Strategic Plan and established 6 broad research areas of Economics, Educations, Politics and Governance, National Security and International Relations, Culture and Society and Lands and Natural Resource Management to restructure National Research Institute, as the countrys premier research institute and public policy Think Tank.
The NRI Council approved for the organizational and salary restructure in April 2022 and further requested the Department of Personnel Management for manpower and technical support due to lack of capacity.
In presenting the proposed structure to SCMC, the Chairman thanked Ms Taies Sansan, Secretary, Ellison Kalimet, Deputy Secretary, William Hapipae, First Assistant Secretary and Jacob Tesse of Department of Personnel Management for their technical advice and support to NRI and acknowledged the leadership of the Secretary in ensuring NRI retrenchment and retirement benefits are paid by State as it can be huge chunk of NRI operational budget.
The National Research Institutes continued growth and development is underpinned by a strong commitment to its legislated mandate to inquire, to better understand PNGs problems, issues and challenges and to inform and helping others understand those problems and finally to influence and advocate for effective public policies based on research and evidence.”
Apart from the mandate to research on education, culture, social, economic and political issues and solutions, NRI is tasked with channeling the results of research undertaken outside PNG and keeping library of such material; train Papua New Guinea graduates as research workers; directing and supervising all research and informing the people about all aspects of indigenous culture of the country; and maintaining a trust fund to finance research.
In line with government objectives, the NRI is working on re-establishing the National Research Council to direct, supervise and monitor all research in PNG and to establish a Research and Innovations Grants Scheme and Trust Fund to encourage research and innovative ideas from any Papua New Guineans outside of the established research institutions to support industries and society.’
