Maintaining the principle of excellence while doing more to boost participation from central and eastern European countries will be key to the success of the EU's next seven year research programme, said ECR Czech MEP Evžen Tošenovský, after Parliament's Research Committee adopted their position on the proposals today.

Maintaining the principle of excellence while doing more to boost participation from central and eastern European countries will be key to the success of the EU’s next seven year research programme, said ECR Czech MEP Evžen Tošenovský, after Parliament’s Research Committee adopted their position on the proposals today.

The new programme which is called Horizion Europe, which is due to run from 2021 – 2027, and funds research in a wide range of areas from frontier science via. The European Research Council to close to market projects under the ‘Open Innovation’ pillar. Finance is also provided for research aimed at helping us to better tackle so called ‘Global Challenges’ such as health, digitisation, energy and food security.

The final budget envelope will be decided during negotiations on the overall Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) which sets the EU’s budget ceilings for a seven year period from 2021 – 2027. Under the Commission’s draft proposal EUR 94 billion was foreseen for the entire Horizon Europe Programme and MEPs in the committee today have now suggested increasing it to EUR 120 billion. However the final amount will depend on the outcome of negotiations with the Council.

Speaking after the vote, Tošenovský said:

“Horizon Europe should follow the same path of the EU’s earlier research and innovation programmes which have been one of the few recognised successes of European funding.

“Maintaining the principle of excellence, meaning that the best project is granted funding, has been key to its success and it was crucial to maintain this under the new Horizon Programme. However, looking at participation rates across Member States, it is clear that we need to continue to put more resources towards helping increase participation from organisations in central and eastern European countries.

“The competitiveness of the EU’s research programmes has made them very attractive to international partners. It is key that we maintain the programme’s outward looking approach and allow participation from outside the EU. The UK has been a key player in EU research programmes and we need to ensure collaboration in future between both sides in order for them to continue their often ground-breaking jointresearch.”