As part of the biggest shake-up of science and technology governance in two decades, the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) last month designated COMSTECH — its committee of science ministers — as its official agency for overseeing science. As a result, COMSTECH will now play an active part in the OIC's ten-year plan for modernization.

The OIC's member states are among the world's lowest producers of patents and research papers. According to the organization's own data, scientists from Islamic-majority countries contributed just 2.5% of articles in peer-reviewed journals between 1995 and 2005.

The OIC's long-term goal is to turn this situation around completely. It wants to see at least 20 OIC universities joining the world's top 500 — there are currently none. It is also planning a new centre for science and innovation policy, and a new network of centres of research excellence. As well as improving access to capital for technology start-ups, the OIC's plans aim to boost the capacity of industry to produce more vaccines, affordable cars and planes, and to increase collaborations with scientists and organizations outside the OIC world.

COMSTECH will share the responsibility for implementing these changes with the OIC secretariat's newly revived science and technology office in Jeddah, and with the Islamic Development Bank, which has allocated 10% of its grants and loans for science and technology. Strategic guidance and oversight will come from a task force that includes the OIC secretary-general, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, a science historian from Turkey, and the chemist Atta-ur-Rahman from Pakistan, who heads the COMSTECH secretariat.

The plans are ambitious and impressive, and deserve the wholehearted support of the OIC's member states. But the big test now is whether that support will be forthcoming. In principle, money should not be a problem: OIC member states include some of the wealthiest nations in the world. Unlike other wealthy states, however, they allocate less than 0.5% of their gross domestic product to research and development.

Related to this is the fact that the member states have a reputation inside the OIC for not delivering on their promises. Witness the controversy over COMSTECH's existing budget. For the fiscal year 2006–7,ministers approved a budget of US$18 million for COMSTECH's work. But only $7 million came through, including $2.3 million from the Islamic Development Bank and $2.6 million from member states. Of this, COMSTECH's host country, Pakistan, contributed $2 million. Twelve of the other 56 countries contributed a mere $600,000 between them. The rest promised much, but gave nothing.

One of the reasons for these broken promises is that, until now, a decision made by a science minister at a COMSTECH meeting has carried little or no weight in that minister's national parliament, or with his or her finance minister. COMSTECH's new status as an official body of the OIC should begin to change this. Jordan, Iran, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have promised new money, and, for the first time, COMSTECH ministers will be able to stand before heads of state and call to account those who do not deliver.

Of course, it will still be possible for any member state to make a commitment and then completely ignore it. But such states need to understand that plans to upgrade universities or build affordable cars need a massive injection of new money. And they must appreciate that OIC institutions created to deliver those promises must be adequately funded. The OIC is right to engage the private sector and development banks in efforts to reform science and technology, but public institutions must also play their part.