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budgets will grow in the future. Indeed, we must be prepared for 

 future budgets that may provide little or no real growth. This 

 makes it imperative that we look for ways to do what we can do 

 even better and that includes developing new ways of coordinating 

 research across agencies and leveraging resources both inside the 

 government and in the private sector. 



NSF's long history of collaboration with other agencies that sup- 

 port research and education in ocean sciences makes me optimistic 

 that we can continue to build on this base in the future. Continued 

 success will depend on our ability to demonstrate to the pubHc how 

 even research in this most fundamental scientific area has implica- 

 tions for improving the quality of our lives. 



The burden of clearly articulating the benefits of federally funded 

 scientific and engineering research and education falls squarely on 

 the shoulders of the research community. These benefits include 

 not only pushing back the frontiers of scientific knowledge, but also 

 educating the next generation of researchers and the scientifically 

 literate citizen who knows how to weigh the potential future value 

 of new discoveries against the cost of the current investments. 



So as you can see, Mr. Chairman, the success of ocean research 

 has been based on strong partnerships in the past. Recognizing this 

 and in the interest of implementing many of the recommendations 

 coming from the oceanographic community, the NSF initiated dis- 

 cussions two years ago on how to improve the field through new 

 partnerships. 



We have benefited from sharing ideas with the community, with 

 Admiral Watkins, and we look forward to the testimony coming for- 

 ward in the rest of this hearing. 



In closing, I want to be on record that NSF is eager to work with 

 the relevant agencies to explore appropriate ways to improve the 

 quality and the coordination of research in the ocean sciences. 



I would be happy to respond to any questions you might have. 

 I would like to apologize in advance, Mr. Chairman. I may have to 

 leave before the end of the question session, with your permission. 



I brought with me today Dr. Robert Corell, who is assistant di- 

 rector of our Geosciences Directorate, who can certainly answer any 

 questions you might have about NSF's role. 



Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 



[The prepared statement of Dr. Lane follows:] 



