Another 151 research positions axed at CSIRO despite $387M federal budget boost

Australia’s leading science institution is undergoing a major structural overhaul, sacrificing hundreds of frontline research roles to ensure its long-term survival.

In just a few days, cuts in rapid succession at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) have stripped 151 positions.

Among the injured are 92 workers from the Environmental Investigation Unit.

A further 59 staff from the health and biosecurity teams were laid off.

The widespread layoffs are part of a brutal downsizing process that was flagged late last year and targets up to 350 research positions.

The haemorrhage is part of a much larger one, with the force axing 1,150 jobs since February 2024, according to union figures from the CSIRO Staff Association.

The rapid scale of the cuts comes despite a massive funding injection of $387.4 million over four years announced in the May federal budget. Finance and Public Service Minister Katy Gallagher said the investment was designed to give the institution “the stability it needs” to continue delivering on its work and future plans.

But he admitted he could not guarantee that more jobs would not be lost.

“The way CSIRO is set up is it is an independent organisation, it has a board and it makes decisions independent of the government and the government supports that,” Ms Gallagher said.

He added that the government believed the funding would “put CSIRO on a sustainable footing”.

However, CSIRO management argues that the organization is struggling with deep-rooted structural problems.

Administrators said last year that the organization “faces long-term financial sustainability challenges and funding has failed to keep pace with the rising costs of running a modern science agency”.

Decades of depleted resources mean the agency must invest up to $135 million a year over the next decade to remain viable.

To deal with this, the agency is aggressively narrowing its focus; It is aggressively abandoning projects that lack critical mass and turning to lucrative, high-tech sectors such as artificial intelligence, energy and robotics.

“Following a comprehensive review of our research portfolio, CSIRO has made strategic choices to develop our research to focus our efforts where we can deliver the greatest national impact,” a CSIRO spokesman said.

“To achieve this sharpened focus, we need to de-prioritize areas where we do not have the scale necessary to achieve significant impact or where others in the ecosystem are better positioned to deliver.”

The strategy has led to major consolidation of internal departments.

Of the 151 total losses, the most recent 59 were canceled as a direct by-product of the merger of the Health and Biosafety unit and the Animal Health Laboratory into a combined Biosafety Research Unit.

While the CSIRO insists the newly created unit will maximize the Australian Center for Disease Preparedness’ expertise in animal, human and plant health without undermining its critical diagnostic capabilities, external scientific bodies are deeply alarmed.

Ryan Winn, chief executive of Science and Technology Australia, described the job cuts as “another blow” to Australia’s science capacity, especially given recent memories of the Covid-19 pandemic and the current diphtheria outbreak.

“The health and biosecurity team at CSIRO already experienced redundancies two years ago. How can we expect to retain or attract people as part of Australia’s STEM workforce when there is so much instability?” Mr. Winn said.

“These jobs are not only a loss for the CSIRO, but may also impact Australia’s ability to respond to future health and biosecurity emergencies.”

Agency leadership remains determined that these painful measures are the only way forward. Chief executive Dr Doug Hilton has previously argued the overhaul was a survival mechanism.

“These are difficult but necessary changes to protect our national science establishment so we can continue to solve the challenges that matter to Australia and Australians,” Dr Hilton said.

“We must build CSIRO for decades to come with a sharp research focus that leverages our unique strengths, allowing us to focus on the deep challenges we face as a nation and deliver solutions at scale.”