CORDIS launches new Website for ETAN - European Technology Assessment Network
CORDIS has just launched a new Website for the European Technology Assessment Network (ETAN), an activity within the Targeted Socio-economic Research (TSER) programme. Managed by the Commission's Directorate for RTD strategy and coordination (DG XII-AS), ETAN is a key element in the Commission's activities for the evaluation of science and technology policy options. The new Website provides details of the objectives, working methods and activities of ETAN. The purpose of ETAN is to promote communication and debate at European level between policy researchers and policy-makers on important science and technology (S&T) policy issues. ETAN's principal working methods are: constituting an expert working group for each selected topic, which reviews, synthesizes and consolidates socio-economic research results into an ETAN "issues and options" working paper; and organizing seminars and conferences bringing together experts, S&T policy-makers and other stakeholders to discuss issues addressed by the expert working groups. Ultimately, ETAN activities will help S&T policy-makers and other stakeholders at EU and national levels to develop a shared understanding of the issues and policy options of common interest and thereby facilitate, where appropriate, the development of more consistent, concerted and complementary Community and national S&T policies. In its current pilot phase, ETAN is running activities on: - Ageing population and technology: challenges and opportunities; - Technology policy in the context of internationalization: how to strengthen Europe's competitive advantage in technology; - Responding to the challenges of global climate change through RTD policy. ETAN has released its first working paper on "Ageing population and technology: challenges and opportunities". This working paper may be downloaded from the ETAN Website, where visitors may also find out more about the objectives, working methods and current activities of ETAN. The new ETAN Website may be found on the CORDIS server, at: http://cordis.europa.eu/etan/home.html