On Monday 19 July, the European ministers responsible for research took part in an informal meeting, once again devoted to the redesign of the European Research Area (ERA).
The meeting provided an opportunity to take stock of the measures that everyone intends to adopt to shape the new ERA (see EUROPE 12571/9): the main focus was on implementing financial and infrastructure initiatives, as well as “soft” measures—discussions at European level, sharing of best practices, etc.—summarised the Slovenian Minister of Education, Science and Sport, Simona Kustec, who chaired the meeting.
The ministers also took note of the draft European R&I “pact”, adopted 2 days earlier by the European Commission and presented as “the first milestone in our ambition for a simplified and more efficient European Research Area” by the competent Commissioner, Mariya Gabriel.
This non-binding text still needs to be formally approved by the EU-27. The Slovenian Presidency is committed to ensuring that this is done within its mandate.
The “pact” will define the values and principles that the EU would like to see applied in national research and innovation systems. Many of the principles set out have already been discussed at ministerial level: scientific freedom (see EUROPE 12585/15), free mobility of researchers (see EUROPE 12729/3), in particular, but also the consideration of gender equality—in research teams as well as “in the content of research”, the draft “pact” states.
The latter will detail the priority actions to be undertaken. In particular, it should reaffirm the importance of generalising open access to scientific publications and research data, further developing open access to European and national research infrastructures, exploiting synergies between research and industry, and securing long-term investments.
Finally, in adopting the “pact”, ministers should agree to set up a monitoring system for the measures implemented and confirm their commitment to raising total spending on research and development to 3% of EU GDP.
Don’t forget the “critical foundations”
On Monday, the European Research Council—whose president was attending the informal meeting of ministers—also reacted publicly to the draft “pact”, saying that it risked “neglecting critical foundations of the ERA”. The EU Council regretted that more emphasis was not placed on the importance of providing sufficient core funding to universities and research institutions.
“Widening excellence and helping to build capacity are worthy goals that are complementary to and cannot replace strengthening Europe’s existing centres that have reached excellence. All these are conditions for Europe to remain attractive and competitive on a global scale”, the institution argued in a statement.
Member States must take a long-term view, it insists, recalling that “countries, which now enjoy good research conditions, do so only because of wise and patient investments over many years”.
To consult the draft “pact”: https://bit.ly/2UV1vWy (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)