Overcoming innovation gaps in the EU-13 Member States

Please note: Each EPRS Study is assigned a DOI (digital object identifier), which is a safe and long term way of ensuring a hyperlink to the full text of this report. However, when ESO creates this record, on occasion the DOI still has not been activated by the EU Bookshop. If you find the source url hyperlink does not work please use the alternative location hyperlink listed as a related url.This study synthesises the outcomes of a project undertaken on behalf of the Science and Technology Options Assessment
(STOA)Panel from November 2016 to May 2017. The aim of the project was to explore, identify and shed light on the reasons for the low participation and success rate of EU-13* countries in the FPs, in order to improve their future performance in Horizon 2020 (H2020) and FP9.

Investing in research is considered essential for achieving smart, sustainable and inclusive growth and jobs in Europe. The EU Framework Programme for research and innovation is the EU’s primary instrument for building the European Research Area. Framework Programmes are expected to produce European added value: therefore the principle of juste retour does not apply. Research needs to be of the highest quality, produced in international collaboration and selected on a competitive basis.

Under such conditions, uneven participation is unavoidable. However, Framework Programme participation appears to be disproportionately weak for an entire region of the EU. After almost 20 years of access to the opportunities of the FPs, the EU-13 still lags behind the EU-15. The aim of this study is to explore, identify and enlighten reasons for the low participation and success rate of EU-13 countries, in order to improve their future performance in Horizon 2020 and in future Framework Programmes.

* The EU-13 countries are the countries that have joined the EU since 2004 - Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia

European Parliament: European Parliamentary Research Service: Study, March 2018: Overcoming innovation gaps in the EU-13 Member States http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2018/614537/EPRS_STU(2018)614537_EN.pdf

European Parliament: European Parliamentary Research Service: Study, March 2018: Overcoming innovation gaps in the EU-13 Member States. Annex http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2018/614537/EPRS_STU(2018)614537(ANN1)_EN.pdf

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