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Simpler, broader, bigger: EU unveils €80 billion research plan

EIT is among the beneficiaries of the Horizon 2020 research and innovation budget proposed 30 November by the European Commission.

Editorial by Science|Business

BRUSSELS - The European Commission proposed a simpler, more economically productive system for funding research and innovation over the coming decade, as it formally launched what promises to be an 18- to 24-month political battle to raise its budget to €80 billion.

"A break from the past and an investment in our future" is what Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science, called Horizon 2020, the European Union's next seven-year plan, for 2014 to 2020, for research and innovation funding. The Commission's intention, she said, is to "support the best research ideas and provide major business opportunities that improve people's lives." And in case that isn't enough, "we're slashing red tape," she said.

The proposed €80 billion budget, if approved in 2012 or 2013 by the European Council and Parliament, would represent a major rise from the current €55 billion programme - and has already hit static from Britain, Germany, France, the Netherlands and other budget-conscious states. But the Commission is betting that its emphasis on simplifying the system, broadening the benefits and focusing more on economic return will by the end of the tortuous EU legislative process win support from all the member-states. The proposal is "part of an exit strategy from the (economic) crisis," said Androulla Vassiliou, Commissioner for Education, Culture, Multilingualism, Sport, Media and Youth.

The series of EU announcements 30 November filled in many - but not all - of the details expected since the Commission first announced its broad, economy-driven 'Innovation Union' strategy in October last year. The new plan includes big sums for the most politically appealing programmes:

• A rise, from €308 million to €2.8 billion, for the European Institute of Innovation and Technology. The plan would permit it to add six more sectoral groups by 2020, in healthcare, food, raw materials, advanced manufacturing, security and urban mobility. The full expansion would be contingent on a mid-term review confirming the EIT is working properly. The objectives include 600 new companies started, and 25,000 masters and 10,000 PhD students trained by 2020.
  
  
• A 77 per cent jump to €13.2 billion for the basic-science European Research Council. The agency, modelled on the US National Science Foundation's no-politics method of awarding research grants based on scientific peer-review panels, has won wide praise for funding 'excellence' in science since it began in 2007. But even with the increase, annual grants by the ERC would be only about a third as much as at the NSF. And there has been some political backlash in eastern and southern Europe because most of the ERC grants to date have gone to science-rich northwestern Europe. The Commission's responses include several measures to reverse the brain drain from the poorer countries, including creation of 'ERA Chairs', funding special professorships to recruit "outstanding academics to institutions with a clear potential for research excellence."
  
  
• €5.75 billion for the Marie Curie Actions that provide study-abroad grants for hundreds of thousands of young students - all of them, and their parents, politically active and potential future supporters of the EU generally.
  
  
• A Small Business Innovation Research programme - modelled partly on established UK and US initiatives - becomes part of a drive to mobilize more small and medium-sized companies to participate in the EU programmes. In all, Tajani said, 15 per cent of the €80 billion Horizon2020 budget is earmarked for SMEs. The plan includes providing SBIR seed funding, which SMEs can apply for singly rather than in the usual EU coalitions, and then helping connect them to the European Investment Bank and other public and private funders for expansion capital. A set of company-support efforts presently in the Competitiveness and Innovation Programme gets a new name (COSME) and a bigger budget (€2.5 billion). The expected impact: 39,000 firms a year assisted, creating 29,500 jobs and 900 new business products or services.
  
  
• The biggest chunk of the budget, or €31.7 billion, will go to 'Societal Challenges' - a set of hot-button social and environmental issues that have risen high on the political agenda across Europe over the past five years. These are healthcare for an ageing population, food security, clean and secure energy, smart and green transport, climate action and resource efficiency, and inclusive and secure societies. The Commission left some details of these efforts to be filled in by the member-states and groups that want to propose solutions. Indeed, the Commission claims that the whole Horizon 2020 programme will be more flexible than its past research plans - which could not adapt quickly to changing political priorities.

The ideas expressed in the news articles are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily represent the position of EIT.