Argentina science budget falls 43% as researchers protest Milei cuts
Severe austerity measures by President Javier Milei have triggered protests from Argentine scientists, highlighting the long-term economic risks of a 43 per cent real-terms reduction in research funding.
Hundreds of researchers and academics gathered in Buenos Aires on Wednesday to protest severe funding reductions imposed by President Javier Milei’s administration. The demonstration underscores growing friction over the libertarian government's aggressive fiscal consolidation strategy, which is now heavily impacting the country's knowledge economy.
Government data shows the budget allocated to science and technology has fallen 43 per cent in real terms between 2023 and 2026. For foreign investors and domestic corporations relying on local innovation, this contraction threatens the pipeline of commercial research and technological development.
The financial squeeze is particularly acute at CONICET, the national scientific research council. According to a report by the Science and Political Economy research group, salaries for researchers and support staff have lost 40.5 per cent of their real value since November 2023.
State-backed laboratories are struggling to maintain basic operations amid the funding squeeze. "We can't keep doing research," said Laura Suad, a 50-year-old research astronomer. "A new student joined the group to do research and we don't have a computer to give them; we can't buy supplies at that level."
Protesters are demanding salary increases, the confirmation of competitively selected positions, and an extension of postdoctoral fellowships that expired in July. The failure to retain this talent risks accelerating a brain drain that would strip Argentina of the human capital necessary to support high-value export sectors.
The institutional strain was compounded in July by the departure of Darío Genua, who headed the national Secretariat of Innovation, Science & Technology. This leadership vacuum arrives as broader social unrest mounts, with trade unions and pensioners joining the scientists after staging their own protests outside the national Congress.
The domestic backlash has drawn international scrutiny regarding the long-term sustainability of the administration's fiscal shock therapy. Twenty-four Nobel laureates and other prominent scientists recently signed a letter to the president, urging him to halt the dismantling of the national research framework.
Protesters wore the sky-blue-and-white colours of the national football team, which recently finished as runners-up in the 2026 World Cup under coach Lionel Scaloni and skipper Lionel Messi. "We're wearing Argentina's shirt because during the World Cup we all came out here to the Obelisk to celebrate," Suad said. "Well, now we've come to demand that the president fund science, technology and universities."
