The National Scientific and Technical Research Council of Argentina (CONICET) was created by Law N° 1291 on February 5th, 1958 after the generalized need to have an academic organism to foster scientific and technological research in the country.
As an antecedent, at the beginning of that decade, during the first administration of President Juan Domingo Perón, the National Technical and Scientific Research Council (CONITYC) was established to develop and modernize the country under a State that fostered science and technology.
The first president of CONICET was Bernardo A. Houssay –Nobel Prize winner in Medicine in 1947- who promoted a strategic vision for the Council by establishing clear organization concepts that maintained for more than a decade of management.
It is an autarchic agency which is under the scope of the National Presidency. In order to achieve a higher level of science and technology in Argentina, the Council used a wide range of tools that are still the core of its actions: the “Careers of Scientific and Technological Researcher” and “Research Support Staff”; fellowships for doctoral and postdoctoral studies; funding of projects and Research Implementation Units; the linkages between international governmental and non-governmental research organizations.
CONICET today
Currently, CONICET is an autarchic entity that depends on the Chieff Cabinet. The Council’s mission is to foster and implement scientific and technological activities in the whole territory and all areas of knowledge. After sixty years of work, CONICET is one of most important assets of the country in terms of science and technology.
- It comprises researchers of all disciplines who work in national universities, scientific and technological research organisms, Implementation Units or other institutions.
- It promotes research, and scientific and technological development in the whole country.
- It has a leading role at a national and international level in terms of the training of high-quality human resources.
- It has an evaluation system implemented from the beginnings of the Council and updated according to its own and some international experience. This participatory and complex assessment system contemplates and takes into account the quality of the research projects, their productivity and career paths of the scientists and research team.
- It represents a source of information and advice for the different institutions of the National Government and the private sector.