Funding for universities and for research may come from three sources: public investment, i.e. national or extra-national government, charities or industry.

In the present atmosphere of fiscal austerity and pragmatism leading to stretched university budgets, academics are encouraged, and indeed forced, to look for sources other than public funds to finance their research and other academic pursuits.

Indeed, their calibre is often gauged by the amount of money they manage to churn out from these sources. This is considered as a laudable target by those who hold that private industry can provide the much-needed supplementary funds for state-of-the-art equipment and research that would otherwise not take place.

Corporate influence may also facilitate technology transfer, that is a more efficient, faster course from research results to the marketplace. Universities have proved themselves at conducting research but have not excelled at creating products.

This trend towards corporate funding, however, amounts to a privatisation life, which has implications on the whole of society and harbours several potential dangers: there is a distinct possibility of conflict of interest between the scientist and the funding industry, which naturally insists on tangible, economically useful results.

Short-term objectives are preferred to long term ones, even if the latter are more socially useful. Industry's primary commitment is to its shareholders and not science. There may be pressure to direct research efforts towards what is more profitable, which may not concur with what is most necessary.

The results of research may be interpreted in a biased manner, with even the possibility of results never been published, when they are not favourable to the funding corporation. There have been several instances of academics being threatened and trials being interrupted when the projected results were not acceptable to the funding industry.

Corporate forces tend to favour cutting-edge technology rather than the improvement and evaluation of impacts of existing technology. The side effect of this is that, since cutting-edge technologies are less well understood, their environmental impact is less predictable and their regulation and control more difficult.

Furthermore, there is always the danger that academics are distracted from their other duties, e.g. teaching. It is even conceivable that corporate interference may extend to curricula and student intake.

Thus, there is an understandable concern about the erosion of scientific independence due to tight academic budgets, the lure of corporate funds and the open encouragement by governments for closer ties between universities and industry as a source of economic growth.

Co-operation between industry and academia should not result in lowering of ethical standards or in undue influence of the interest of industry on the decisions of the researcher.

All this is not an exercise in ethical fundamentalism, but rather stems from the realisation that academic pursuits are too important for the growth of knowledge, as well as protection and betterment of society, to be controlled or effectively influenced by sectors whose primary aim is profit.

One must point out that corporations are not the only source of encroachment on intellectual independence. Governments can be similarly guilty. As an example, the early reports on the link between Bovine Spongiform Encephalitis (BSE) and the human variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease, were discouraged by the United Kingdom Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, as uncovered by the Philips Enquiry.

One can make a few suggestions to help untangle this complex knot: the obligatory disclosure of conflict of interest, though a positive step, is not always completely practical. Besides, it is not a sufficient guarantee against bias.

Complete separation of academia from corporate funding is an ideal that is probably impractical. Corporate funding would become acceptable if channelled through a common financial pool.

The distribution of funds can be overseen by an independent body or the University Ombudsman, who should be sufficiently independent and powerful. This will protect academics from undue interference and censorship of results.

It is not in anybody's interest to demonise or shun industry. As indicated in the initial part of this article, there are some advantages in such a co-operation. However, one needs the appropriate attitudes and mechanisms to protect the interest of civil society against those of powerful individuals and corporate industry.

A decline in the impact of public funding for the university is short-sighted and will ultimately harm all strata of society.