As of January 2020, Lukas A. Huber, the President of ÖGMBT, will take office as Vice-President of VWGÖ, the Federation of Austrian Scientific Societies. The VWGÖ includes 220 scientific societies across all disciplines (Law, Economy & Social Sciences, Medicine & Pharmacy, Natural Sciences, Humanities, Basic and Integrative sciences, Fine Arts, Agriculture & Forestry, Theology etc.) representing 30.000 scientists.

The VWGÖ was founded following World War II in order to revive the scientific community in Austria. Politics, industry and commerce and the broader public needed to be convinced that the foundation of scientific societies is indispensable for progress.

Today the awareness raising and lobbying activities are needed more than ever, given shrinking public budgets for science. It was from this background, that the ÖGMBT took the strategic decision to nominate its President Lukas Huber, as Vice-President of VWGÖ.

Protest against Central Bank “Jubiläumsfonds” to be reserved only for economic research.

An example of a recent initiative: since centuries the ÖNB (Austrian Central Bank) has a “Jubiläumsfonds/Jubilee Fund” which annually allocated 6 Million €uro for scientific research of all disciplines and was thus a pillar for research funding. End 2019 the ÖNB announced that it would henceforth only fund projects that are relevant to the “Central Bank, fiscal policy, stability of finance markets, investment strategies etc.” The VWGÖ strongly voiced its concern against this announcement of ÖNB and involved the press. Not only did the press print the protest, but various other media constantly asked the OeNB about it. Georg Sachs, editor-in-chief of Chemiereport/Austrian Life Sciences, who recently published a very good article in the new Chemiereport, was particularly persistent. Irrespective of the OeNB's adherence to the decision, we will continue to act in the interest of our members.

– see Chemie Report 8/2019 Pp 42/43

For more info about VWGÖ visit http://vwgoe.at/