Brussels, 15/04/2005 (Agence Europe) - The Competitiveness Council on 18 April in Luxembourg under the presidency of Luxembourg Ministers for Economy and Research, Jeannot Krecke and François Bilten respectively, will be essentially devoted to presentation of the Commission's latest proposals for revival of the Lisbon Strategy and to the draft 7th framework programme for research and development and negotiations on the ITER project.
During two informal dinners on Sunday evening, ministers will discuss the 7th FPRD and hold an exchange of views on the results of the Spring Council on reactivation of the Lisbon Strategy and on the theme of “post-Tokyo competitiveness”.
On Monday, the Council will first of all examine follow-up to the conclusions of the European Council on 22 and 23 March on reactivating the Lisbon Strategy. To this backdrop, European Commissioner for Industry Günter Verheugen will present the latest Commission work and in particular: (1) recommendations on integrated guidelines for growth and employment adopted on 12 April (EUROPE 8926), which encompass the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines (BEPG) and the guidelines for employment. It is on the basis of these integrated guidelines that the Member States will then establish three-year national reform programmes that meet their specific needs and situation; (2) the “better regulation” initiative” of 18 March (EUROPE 8911) aimed at ensuring that the Community regulatory framework meets the requirements of the 21st century; (3) the new Competitiveness and Innovation Programme (CIP) (over EUR 4 billion for the period 2007-2013) adopted on 7 April (EUROPE 8923) which, in addition to the new elements, groups already-existent specific programmes but introduces new actions aimed in particular at improving the innovative capacity of EU enterprises and the regulatory framework applicable to enterprise, especially SMEs.
The Council will then devote its work to research:
(1) European Research Commissioner Janez Potocnik, will present the draft 7th FPRD for the period 2007-2013 (with a total budget of EUR 73.215 billion) that the Commission adopted on 6 April (EUROPE 8921, 8922 and 8923). On the basis of a note prepared by the Luxembourg Presidency, the ministers will be invited to give their opinion and formulate comments on: - the general structure of the 7th FPRD divided between activities relating to cooperation, ideas, population, capacity and the Joint Research Centre; - cooperation (research in collaboration) covered by nine themes retained in the project (health, food/agriculture, information technologies, nanoscience and nanotechnology, energy, environment and climate, transport, socio-economic sciences, space and security); - human potential and above all actions proposed for initial training, lifelong training, careers, bridges between enterprise and the academic world and specific actions such as prizes for excellence; - simplification and rationalisation of the 7th FPRD; - rationalisation of financing instruments, and simplification of operational programmes and management of the 7th FPRD.
(2) Over lunch, Mr Potocnik will inform research ministers of the state of progress of international negotiations on the ITER project and implementation of the timetable. He will speak of his visit to Japan on 11 and 12 April (EUROPE 8926).
(3) During the afternoon, the Council will discuss human resources in the field of research and development and is expected to adopt conclusions on the recent Commission contributions regarding: - the recommendation of 11 March concerning the European Researcher Charter and a code of conduct for recruiting researchers (EUROPE 8907); - the document of 11 March entitled “Women and Science: excellence and innovation - gender equality in science”; - working documents of 5 April entitled “A Mobility Strategy in the European Research Area (ERA)” and “Research in the ERA: a profession, multiple careers”. The draft conclusions stress the need to provide researchers with the possibility of a lasting career at every stage of their career, to improve scientific excellence by promoting awareness on gender equality issues and facilitating intra-Community, international and trans-sectoral mobility of research workers.
Furthermore, the Council is also expected to adopt draft conclusions on tourism and competitiveness (on the basis of the Commission communication of November 2003 entitled “Basic Guidelines for the sustainability of the European tourism sector”, inviting Member States to implement an approach based on cooperation between the players in the tourist sector, with a view to contributing to the work of the “Sustainability and Tourism Group” created by the Commission and responsible for developing a European Tourism Agenda 21 by 2007.