The Victorian Auditor-General, Des Pearson, has release a report into public sector investment in biotechnology in Victoria, finding that the state government had spent more than $722 million to support the biotechnology industry over the last decade without  adequate performance data on whether strategic aims had been met.

 

The report found that the primary focus of performance measurement by the Department of Business and Innovation had been monitoring the impact of short-term stimulatory activity in the sector, without evident attention to the delivery of longer-term and strategic benefits.

 

“As a result, after more than ten years of active investment and ‘market intervention’ in the biotechnology sector, DBI is not yet able to objectively demonstrate the development of a cause and effect relationship between its investments in the biotechnology sector and the results achieved in that sector.”

 

The report called for DBI to “address these issues so that progressive assurance can be provided that its portfolio of investments in biotechnology is both targeted to where it is needed and is achieving its intended purpose.”

 

The report is available here.