New report highlights cooperative nature of EU's future research policy
An expert group established as part of the Seventh Framework Programme's (FP7) regional calls for 2010 has just published a new report containing several key recommendations for the future of EU research policy. Since October 2010, the Synergies Expert Group (SEG), made up of experts, rapporteurs and representatives from FP7, the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) and the Cohesion Policy Funds, has been analysing how EU research policy should be aligned across the main European research policy framework programmes and actions. With the keyword being 'synergy', the taskforce set out to develop 'synergies in practice' for the current programming period, as well as to explore how research and development (R&D) can be enhanced in the future. The work of the group also focused on the future of two regional actions under FP7: Regions of Knowledge (RoK) and the Research Potential (REGPOT). The philosophy behind synergy is very much one of joining up the dots to ensure that policies are aligned and don't overlap. This will allow the overall research objectives of the Innovation Union and the Europe 2020 strategy to be better achieved. The strategy defines the key role of research, technological development, and demonstration (RTD) as well as of innovation as among the most important engines for growth. In their report, the group found that innovation policies at EU level are currently fragmented and that coordination of research and innovation as well as cohesion policies at European, national and regional levels, both within and between these levels, is suboptimal. They also highlighted a need for common strategies in accordance with the orientations of Europe 2020, and a lack of a coherent and interacting governance structure. Other problems include weak complementarities and compatibilities as well as interoperability of policies and programmes, particularly regarding the regional dimension in research and innovation policy, and the research and innovation dimension in regional policy. A lack of instruments aimed at supporting the pooling of European and national funds and poor communication, coordination and cooperation between actors and stakeholders at all levels, were also identified as areas for improvement. The group also recommends that the Structural Funds be better exploited for innovative public procurement and demonstrations projects, and thus for better support of the 'smart growth' objective. In addition, they advise using the European Social Fund (ESF) to promote greater synergies between education and innovation programmes by making it more innovation oriented. A key point of the SEG report was the need to ensure that the regional aspect of research remains at the top of the EU policy agenda, a feature shared with another report released recently, 'Analysis and recommendations for the future evolution of the Research Potential Activity of the EU-EU FP7 Capacities Programme'. This latter report contains the findings of the Expert Group on Research Potential Project Portfolio, a group set up by the European Commission to analyse the impact of Research Potential projects. Based on these findings, the group then went on to make recommendations for the continuing evolution of the Research Potential programme. Research Potential projects began in 2000 in light of the aims of the Lisbon Strategy to make the EU the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world. The European Research Area (ERA) was created to link up research institutions right across the EU, and Research Potential projects were designed to incorporate these new aims into the already existing EU research framework programmes. The activity has allowed many research institutes to upgrade their RTD capacity through the recruitment of highly skilled, experienced researchers and has facilitated the acquisition of state-of-the-art equipment. The ultimate aim was the integration of these research entities into ERA as well as the improvement of their participation in EU FP7 projects.For more information, please visit: Final Report of the Synergies Expert Group: ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/fp7/docs/seg-final_en.pdf Analysis and recommendations for the future evolution of the Research Potential Activity of the EU-EU FP7 Capacities Programme: ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/fp7/docs/potential-activity-report_en.pdf Seventh Framework Programme: http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/home_en.html