Innovation and entrepreneurship still lacking in Europe, says Liikanen
'We need a more innovative, entrepreneurial Europe,' EU Commissioner for Enterprise and the Information Society, Erkki Liikanen, told delegates attending the Eurochambres congress in Rome on 9 October. The Commission will do its bit to encourage innovation with the publication of an innovation action plan, announced Mr Liikanen. The document will outline measures that could be implemented at EU level to help enterprises become more competitive through innovation, and will be issued next year in time for enlargement. Mr Liikanen claimed that in order for innovation to emerge, businesses have to be willing to take risks and experiment with new ideas. While some Member States have a very strong entrepreneurial tradition, the EU in general has a 'deficit' in this area, he asserted. As a result, the general capacity for innovation remains relatively low compared to the main global players. Experts claim that the fact that European businesses spend less on research and development (R&D) than their counterparts in the US or Japan must be a factor behind Europe's weaker innovation performance. 'We are still not good enough at coming up with new industrial and business processes, new products and services, and at exploiting them to give us the edge over the international competition,' explained the Commissioner. Mr Liikanen claimed that that the need to improve the situation is very high on the Commission's agenda, noting that several key initiatives are already under way at EU level to help solidify the innovation and entrepreneurial base in Europe. They include the Commission's action plan aimed at increasing investment in R&D to three per cent by 2010, the introduction of a new impact assessment procedure aimed at improving the regulatory framework which governs the way business is done in Europe, and a green paper on entrepreneurship. Following the wide public discussion on the green paper, Mr Liikanen announced that an action plan for entrepreneurship will be presented towards the end of the year, and will be tabled for further debate at the EU's spring summit.