South African science councils form an integral part of the national system of innovation. R&D performed by science councils, in areas such as the social sciences, health, agriculture, industrial development, or water, inform critical policy decisions by government, as well as other actors. This fact sheet demonstrates the profile of R&D expenditure in science councils in 2017/18: between 2008/09 and 2017/18 for example, both annual R&D expenditure and R&D capital expenditure doubled. R&D spending by research field and socio-economic objective in 2017/18 closely mirrored national priority areas, such as economic development, health, and education.
Human Sciences Research Council (Wed,) studied this question.