''There's acknowledgment around the world from scientists that biodiversity faces an enormous crisis,'' Allan Wilson Centre director and University of Otago researcher Prof Hamish Spencer said.
''New Zealand is part of that, but we don't seem to be responding.''
The internationally renowned centre, based at Massey University, is a network of more than 100 researchers who study evolution and ecology.
The centre lost its funding earlier this year, 13 years after it opened, when the Tertiary Education Commission elected not to renew its spot on the Centre of Research Excellence (Core) funding list.
It will lose its funding and close at the end of this year.
Prof Spencer said he did not begrudge the 10 organisations that were awarded Core funding this round.
''I don't want to knock the centres that did receive funding. They're doing some excellent work.''
But the Wilson Centre's loss of funding fitted into a broader theme of conservation and biodiversity research being undervalued, he said.
''If you look at the pattern of the things that were funded, they're all things that reflected [Science and Innovation Minister Steven Joyce]'s interest in raising GDP through scientific activity ... I think science can be much broader than that, and bring other benefits to society than raising GDP.''
Mr Joyce contested Prof Spencer's assertion. Growing the GDP was ''not our goal for science'', he said.
''The goal is to provide high-impact science and achieve excellent economic, environmental, social, and cultural outcomes for New Zealand,'' he said.
''Protecting New Zealand's biodiversity is, in any event, hugely important for economic development.''
Mr Joyce also disagreed that biodiversity work was underfunded in New Zealand.
''This Government has a number of initiatives to protect New Zealand's biodiversity,'' he said.
''If anything, [funding for biodiversity research] is increasing.''
But Otago zoology Prof Jon Waters, who is also a Wilson Centre researcher, mostly agreed with Prof Spencer.
He identified recent cuts to the Department of Conservation as ''one example where [conservation] seems to be less of a priority [to the Government]''.
Doc's new-found focus on public-private partnerships in the wake of the cuts was also mirrored across the research sector, Prof Waters said.
''The way science is funded is changing quite quickly at the moment,'' he said.
''If you've got links to business ... there's a sense that [a research project] is very heavily weighted if there's business interest in there.''
Prof Waters said he was all for businesses funding conservation work, but he knew they would not always want to.
''If a business wants to put money into conservation, that's great, and that should happen,'' he said.
''But there's got to be room for investigative-driven basic science, which enhances the understanding of native species.
''Those things are important, as well as what business wants.''
And Otago Prof Neil Gemmell, another member of the Wilson Centre, said the centre's funding being cut was ''fundamentally linked'' to ongoing restructuring and cuts at AgResearch, the national Crown Research Institute of which Prof Gemmell is the University of Otago chairman.
''They're fundamentally linked by changes in the way that we focus on science, with a very strong applied focus, following where the money is,'' he said.
''That's understandable at one level, but perhaps short-sighted.''
The loss of the Wilson centre, he said, would be a great loss to conservation research and training.
''It's a terrible shame.''
