"The meaning of the cuts at the Volcani Agricultural Research Institute - the cessation of activity"

This is what the Director General of the Agricultural Research Administration (Volcani Institute), Prof. Eli Feinerman, said in a discussion at the Knesset's Science and Technology Committee. The chairman of the committee MK Uri Makalev (Torah Judaism) expressed his opposition to the cut: "I will work with the finance committee in a joint discussion to prevent the cut." Dr. Nirit Bernstein, a researcher at the institute, said: "We discovered to our astonishment that while the prime minister is promoting the copying of the institute, his good friend Shaul Elovich owns land adjacent to the Volcanic Institute." 

The budget proposal of Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel revealed a deep cut in the budget of the Vulcani Institute for Agricultural Research. According to the proposal, the institute's salary and operations budget in 2019 will drop from approximately NIS 255 million to NIS 199 million - a 22% cut.

The Science and Technology Committee of the Knesset expressed overwhelming opposition to the cut and called for a joint meeting with the Finance Committee of the Knesset prior to the transfer of the ministry's budget to prevent the cut. In the discussion held on Monday in light of the proposal of Knesset members Eitan Brushi, Ofer Shelah and Ahmed Tibi, the chairman of the committee and the Knesset members expressed their astonishment at the dramatic cut from the institute, which has great importance and contribution to developments in the agricultural industry in Israel and around the world.

The chairman of the committee, MK Uri Makleb, said: "The Volcanic Institute is very valuable to the State of Israel - we no longer have research and development in agriculture of the great order of the institute, and its contribution to agriculture in Israel is immeasurable. Reality proves that when high-ranking guests from the world arrive in Israel, they are taken to the Institute's premises to impress them with the conceptual and human capital that the country has. When I first saw the announcement of the cuts, I was sure that there had been a mistake - it goes against all logic that the Minister of Agriculture, who is supposed to take care first and foremost of strengthening the institute, is ready to sign off on such a cut. It's a shame that such a debate, which is at the core of the Ministry of Agriculture, he and the CEO are absent. It is also unthinkable that the ministry would make such a significant cut without coordinating with the institute's management and without preparing a position paper indicating the possibilities of the cut."

The director of the institute, Prof. Eli Feinerman, said in the discussion that he received the information about the institute's planned cut for 2019 by complete surprise, "The cut was imposed by surprise without any joint examination with the management. There is a complete lack of coordination here. Such a cut of 55.3 million NIS from the base budget of the Volcanic Institute means a fatal injury to the research activity to the point of stopping it and stopping the activity."

Dr. Nirit Bernstein from the institute's committee of researchers, said in the discussion that "Since Uri Ariel took up his position as Minister of Agriculture, he has put the Volcanic Institute in his sights. He is promoting an initiative to "copy" the institute which will actually lead to its closure. This unreasonable cut in the budget proves once again that his intention is not to move the institute to the north - but to eliminate it."

She added: "The proposal submitted by the Minister of Agriculture to move the Volcanic Institute to the North is completely contrary to a government decision made at the end of 2012 that sought to leverage agricultural research through increased budgets and actually emphasized the importance of agricultural research. Because that's how you mark a goal. Ignoring what happened in the past. The proposal encountered many difficulties because this is what happens when you act against professional recommendations. So the National Economic Council headed by Avi Simhon working in the Prime Minister's Office examined the feasibility of the initiative through the National Research and Development Council (NRDC) and the conclusions of the NRC report were unequivocally against the initiative to copy the Volcanic Institute and pointed to the significant damage that could be caused to research if the initiative were to be implemented . What did the Ministry of Agriculture and the National Economic Council do? Hide the report".

"And professional conclusions deterred the minister or the prime minister? no and no. The Prime Minister appointed another team to examine the transition to the North. They also hid the report prepared by the MOLMOPF from this team. And why say that they already have a government report that stated that copying the institute could cause more harm than good? How does it help achieve the goal? The composition of the team appointed by the Prime Minister was biased towards the goal of copying the institute from the very beginning. Real estate and finance people sat in it and not even a single researcher. We, and the workers' committee, had to ask for the help of the Supreme Court, which determined unequivocally that the composition of the committee was biased and ordered the addition of an agricultural researcher."

She further stated: "Several months ago we discovered to our astonishment that while the Prime Minister is promoting the copying of the Institute - and in our opinion improperly - his good friend Shaul Elovich has land adjacent to the Volcanic Institute. We called on the Attorney General to start an investigation and indeed the matter is under his investigation these days. But a few days after our appeal to the Attorney General, decrees began to land on us in a chain."

MK Dov Hanin (the joint list) called in the debate for the enforcement agencies to open an investigation into the intention to move the volcanic institute to the north of the country, "The news is that Mr. Shaul Elovitz has land in the area of ​​the institute and the purpose of moving the institute is related to him. This is also the reason for the horizontal cut that is being discussed now, which is cutting into the meat of the institute, drying up its entire budget and forcing it to close systems. This move is dramatic and dangerous. I do not doubt the performance abilities of the appointed minister - Uri Ariel has many performance receipts but in areas that interest him. Agriculture simply does not interest him."

MK Eitan Brushi (the Zionist camp) said in the debate: "We have never faced such a worrying reality that the Ministry of Agriculture issues a decree cutting the research and development budget. If there was to be a vote of no confidence in the Ministry of Agriculture, it would be passed by a large majority here in the building. The government is cutting the Volcanic Institute and the most advanced agriculture in the world in order to finance the houses in the path of the ancestors - houses that should not have been there in the first place."

MK Ofer Shelah (Yesh Atid) said: "I joined the request for discussion because in my opinion this is about a national goal in the first place. There is a deliberate intention here to eliminate the Volcanic Institute. Take a magnificent Zionist enterprise, which is no less high-tech than the high-tech complexes in Herzliya or Ramat Hay'il - the conceptual capital that resides in the institute is at least a billion NIS. I don't want to engage in speculation, but the letter from the director general of the Ministry of Agriculture for discussion is less insulting and indicates a deliberate intention to eliminate the institute. If the cut happens, it will be a cry for generations for the Israeli economy and for Israeli agriculture."

MK Yael Cohen Faran said in the debate: "The institute is Israel's pride in the world. Dozens of researchers arrived here who stopped an impressive day's work because this matter is in their minds and this indicates the seriousness of it - damage to research that will place us in a good place in the future. My feeling is that the cut is being imposed on the institute as a fait accompli without any coordination because they did not move to the north. As soon as the institute does not want to obey the instructions of the refugee level, then it is now pushed into a corner."

Sion Jankowitz, director of budgets at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, responded in the discussion on behalf of the ministry's management and said: "It was the government that decided that the Ministry of Agriculture would suffer a horizontal cut. The cut in the entire Ministry of Agriculture is 10% - NIS 170 million. The ministry sees great importance in agricultural research and rejects any accusation that there is an intention to act to close it."

The committee's chairman, MK Uri Makleb, signed off on the discussion: "It is clear what the consequences will be if the aforementioned cuts are implemented, but there is another issue here, which is the alienation of the ministry from the institute. We also saw it in the absence of the senior representatives from the discussion. The committee demands the ministry's intervention in the matter to prevent the cuts in the Volcanic Institute. In addition, I will bring about an urgent discussion of the Science Committee and the Finance Committee together before the Ministry of Agriculture's budget is approved."