Von der Leyen wants to “put research and innovation at the heart of our economy”: more investment in the ERC, critical technologies and European Universities.
July still saw a flurry of activity before the political Brussels went on summer vacation: On 1 July, Hungary took over the Presidency of the EU, on 3 July Canada officially became associated to Horizon Europe’s Pillar 2, and most importantly on 18 July Ursula von der Leyen got re-elected as President of the European Commission. On that occasion she held a programmatic speech and published her political guidelines with strong references to research and education.
The Hungarian Presidency is taking place in a time of transition to a new European Parliament and a new European Commission. Nevertheless, the Hungarian government set relevant priorities for research, innovation and education for the second semester 2024. First, they want to increase the EU’s competitiveness through combating fragmentation of the European R&I systems. On this topic, they will propose Council Conclusions, linked to the new ERA Policy Agenda that is currently being prepared. Second, the Hungarian Presidency will work on advanced materials that are crucial for the EU’s competitiveness and economic security. Third, they want to explore the possibility for a new private-public partnership in the circular bioeconomy with a focus on the collaboration between Eastern and Central European countries (BIOEAST), including the Western Balkan and Eastern Partnership countries, such as Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine. On education, the Hungarian Presidency wants to foster a competitive European higher education sector by leading further discussions on the European Degree and the European University alliances. Second, the Presidency will also focus on strategic partnerships between companies, vocational education and training (VET) providers and other learning centres to improve coordination and foster work-based learning. This includes more flexible pathways between higher education and VET. This reminds us strongly of the Swiss education system that has a lot of flexibility built-in. Finally, the Presidency wants to focus on the role of education and training in the green and digital transition and discuss how learning pathways can support closing labour market gaps and equip learners with the right skills for the challenges ahead.
Canada is now officially associated to Horizon Europe in Pillar 2, as Commissioner Iliana Ivanova and the Canadian Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, François-Philippe Champagne, signed the Association Agreement in Montreal. Through this agreement Canadian researchers and other R&I actors can now fully join and also coordinate Horizon Europe consortia and receive direct funding from the programme. Up until the signature, a transitional agreement had been in place to allow Canadian R&I actors to already apply for funding as ‘prospective beneficiaries’ of Pillar 2 in 2024. Since 1987, Canadian organisations had already actively participated in over 919 EU research projects bringing in their own funding. According to a recent Commission report, there are currently ongoing association negotiations with the South Korea and preliminary discussions with Japan and Singapore.
On 18 July 2024, the European Parliament re-elected Ursula von der Leyen as President of the European Commission for a new five-year mandate. Her political guidelines present her programme and include strong references to education and research. Von der Leyen made it clear that the next mandate will be all about boosting competitiveness and prosperity. She announced her plan to create a new European Competitiveness Fund for strategic technologies like cleantech and AI. She made it clear that research and innovation are key elements in this drive for competitiveness, in her words: “We need to put research and innovation at the heart of our economy”. Therefore, von der Leyen makes the case for more investment in fundamental research and disruptive innovation and calls for an ”expansion of the ERC and the EIC”. She also stresses the importance of critical technologies and proposes the creation of a new European AI Research Council providing computational power, a cloud infrastructure and funding for AI research. Lastly, she also wants more investment in dual-use technologies. On education, von der Leyen explicitly calls for a stronger Erasmus+ programme, especially in the vocational sector in order to address the skills shortages in Europe. She also mentions the necessity to strengthen the European University alliances. In this regard, the European Commission published the results of the most recent call for new European Universities: Among the 14 new alliances, another three Swiss higher education institutions join the initiative (Bern University of Applied Sciences BFH, University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland FHNW, and the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland SUPSI). This brings the total number of Swiss universities involved to 12 (see Movetia article), which represents more than half of all Swiss higher education institutions and roughly more than two thirds of all university students in Switzerland.