ACS Presidential Agenda, 2005
The Chemistry Enterprise, 2015

In the year 2004, it is impossible not to recognize that the chemistry enterprise is now truly global. We see it in the migration of students and professionals across national borders. We see it as new facilities are located in developing countries so as to utilize inexpensive raw materials and serve new markets. We see it in the negative trade balance in chemicals.

I believe we have a responsibility to understand how these and other activities impact the future composition, size and shape of the chemistry enterprise in the US, and the role of working chemists in it. Next year, I would like all members to participate in a process developing and debating scenarios of how the enterprise—education, industry and government--will change in the next ten years. Most importantly, my goal is to understand how we can help our current and future members adapt to these changes and take advantage of the opportunities they will present.

I am asking divisions, through some of their programming, and committees as part of their regular work, to dedicate some time at the San Diego meeting next spring to this question. I hope they will discuss the evolution of the chemistry enterprise over the next ten years, particularly in the context of their division’s or committee’s interest. Here are some examples that are meant to be illustrative and not restrictive.

The Society Committee on Education (SocEd), the division of Chemistry Education (CHED), have a stake in where our students will come from, how many there will be, where they will end up and what they will be doing when they get there. They might speculate on how education itself will change here, in Europe and in Asia.

Divisions like Small Chemical Business (SCHB), Business Development and Management (BMGT), Chemical Technicians (TECH) and Industrial & Engineering Chemistry (I&EC) as well as the Committee on Education and Professional Advancement (CEPA) and Corporation Associates may want to discuss the state of business and employment, including demographic changes in types of jobs and types and sizes of employers.

The divisions of Biochemical Technology (BIOT) and Medicinal Chemistry (MEDI) and may wish to talk about research in the biomedical and pharmaceutical areas and the potential extent for development of offshore research operations by large and small pharmaceutical and biotech companies.

The divisions of Fuel Chemistry (FUEL), Petroleum Chemistry (PETR) and perhaps Agricultural and Food Chemistry (AGFD) can forecast the availability of traditional raw materials and potential for alternative feedstocks.

Chemical Health and Safety (CHAS), Chemistry and the Law (CHAL), Environmental Chemistry (ENVR), the Committee on Environmental Improvement (CEI) and Patents and Related Matters (P&RM) may wish to speculate on the future of regulation, environmental performance, security and intellectual property protection here and abroad, and particularly whether equity in these areas exists now or will in the future, and the implications.

We do not need to revise or update the NAS study on future research challenges called “Beyond the Molecular Frontier” but the Committee on Science (ComSci) might consider whether the approach to academic research either in professional relationships between lead researcher and collaborators or sources of funding will change in that period.

There may be other entities with other points of interest who would also like to contribute. All are welcome.

To start, I asked committees and division officers schedule some time at the Philadelphia meeting to discuss how to stage such an effort in San Diego. By December 1 we will develop a short background paper on current forces driving chemistry economically and scientifically to provide all with a common starting point. It will not draw conclusions but will simply describe the state of play as of January 1, 2005. CEPA will present a plenary Presidential event in San Diego related to these topics.

In San Diego, Committees and Divisions will devote portions of their programming or regular meeting to presentations and particularly discussion of the Enterprise 2015 topic from the perspective of their particular discipline. Those discussions should be reduced by a rapporteur in each group to a short paper. Those papers will be aggregated and harmonized during the summer to provide a bottom-up view from the membership of where we think chemistry is going.

Next fall in Washington, DC, presentations summarizing this paper will be combined with outside views from economists and other experts and presented in a plenary Presidential event. A town meeting will follow, and the year’s study will be reduced to a short monograph summarizing what we have learned and constituting a career “guidebook” for those currently in or entering chemistry. I have contracted with a writer who knows the topic well and will write the situation analysis and the interim and final documents.

The goal of Enterprise 2015 is to understand, plan for and make the most of change. We can be better prepared to find opportunity in those changes—and there will be opportunity--for ourselves and those who will join us in the profession in the future.