A new partnership between science and politics. European scientists ought to adapt to new research policy paradigms.

The European Research Council: The ‘Mayor Group’ report and the Commission’s views on basic research and its impact

Data protection and research in the European Union: a major step forward, with a step back

I n March 2000, European heads of governments and of states agreed in Lisbon that by 2010, the European Union (EU) should become “the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world, capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion.”[*][1] To implement this objective, they agreed in Barcelona in 2002 to devote 3% of their gross domestic product (GDP) in 2010 to R&D and to foster common science policies in a “European Research Area,” as proposed by EU research commissioner Philippe Busquin. To meet these ambitious goals, the EU countries need to move beyond rhetoric and commit to substantial increases in their R&D spending. Several reports released in 2003 by the European Commission (the political and administrative arm of the EU) indicate that the EU countries invest much less in research than the United States or Japan (1.9% of GDP, compared with 2.8% for the United States and 3.0% for Japan in 2000).[†][2] Furthermore, although the EU countries produce the highest number of science graduates and postgraduates (2.14 million graduates in 2000, compared with 2.07 million in the United States) and publish more scientific papers (37% of global scientific papers, compared with 31% for the United States and 10% for Japan), they employ fewer researchers than the United States or Japan (5.4 researchers per 1000 workers, compared with 8.7 in the United States and 9.7 in Japan). In a recent action plan,[‡][3] the European Commission sets out how the EU can bridge the growing gap in research investment between Europe and the United States. According to the plan, a research investment of 3% of GDP would result in ∼0.5% of additional growth and 400,000 additional jobs every year after 2010. To reach this level of investment, the European research effort will have to grow by 8% per year; business funding for R&D will have to increase more (9%) than public funding (6%), because it lags far behind in most countries. Given the present trend in public budgets in Europe, these targets are very ambitious. To facilitate the 8% growth and better integrate and coordinate research activities, the EU aims to create a European Research Area, which would increase the efficiency and competitiveness of European research by avoiding dispersion of funding on subcritical programs. By pooling national and EU resources—such as those of the present Framework Program for R&D (3.5 billion euros per year)—the European Research Area could fund joint research programs, build and operate common research facilities (such as new x-ray sources), and promote the mobility of researchers across Europe. Furthermore, the creation of a European Research Council has been proposed by European scientists and is supported by heads of research organizations and the European Science Foundation.[§][4] The council would encompass all disciplines and complement national agencies and the Framework Program. It would, for example, provide grants and fellowships for individual researchers and groups, thereby facilitating better use of European research facilities. In the long term, the council could establish leading-edge research centers. Governments await a report on this proposal from a panel of science policy-makers chaired by Federico Mayor, former director general of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, and aim to make a decision in 2004. Additional funding is needed to meet these objectives and to support projects from young scientists. This can only be achieved if scientists apply strong pressure on EU governments. A complication, and a challenge, arises from the fact that at least 10 new countries will soon join the EU. Most of these countries have an old scientific tradition, but their scientific infrastructures must be renewed. Furthermore, public spending in EU countries is under severe constraints, because budget deficits must not exceed 3% of GDP. Governments and the European Commission have recently suggested that public investments for research and defense should be excluded from this 3% limit. Increased R&D is crucial for the future economic and social well-being of Europe. The commitment to increased public and private investment in research should be implemented soon by all EU countries. Several countries, including Sweden and Finland, have already met the Barcelona objective, but others are far from reaching it. This year, France even reduced public support for research and recruitment of researchers. We also have to move beyond rhetoric to implement the European Research Area. The draft European constitution defines research and technological development as a shared prerogative between individual countries and the EU. This is a positive step, but all these ambitious objectives require a strong political will, which has yet to be demonstrated by governments all over Europe. [1]: #fn-1 [2]: #fn-2 [3]: #fn-3 [4]: #fn-4

Disharmonization in the Regulation of Transgenic Plants in Europe

The debate about the potential risks of genetically modified organisms has lasted for almost three decades without any final conclusion in sight. Why is it that the public remains critical of this technology even though science has so far not demonstrated any tangible risks to human health and the environment?

N ew developments in European science and science policy suggest that a new landscape is forming, one in which scientists move about as freely in Europe as they go between Massachusetts and California in the United States. The great scientific traditions of Europe have had strong national identities; one naturally thinks of Pasteur as French, Newton as British, Pauli as German. But in the movement toward an economically unified Europe, some national sovereignty had to be given up to serve a more communitarian vision. That same kind of evolution is now taking place in science, as a powerful movement toward a unified European research enterprise takes form. In a recent editorial in Le Monde , several Nobel Prize winners (including French biologist Francois Jacob, Swedish biochemist Bengt Samuelsson, British biochemist Aaron Klug, and Italian developmental biologist Rita Levi Montalcini) called for a massive restructuring that would double support for science with a renewed focus on basic research, and fund centers of excellence that would be regional and not national. Soon afterward, the European Commission (EC) issued a press release pointing out that European countries collectively produce proportionally more scientists than the United States, but that scientists constitute a much smaller proportion of the working population. Noting this retention problem, the EC advocated increased European Union (EU) research investments (see the [Editorial by Papon][1], Science 1 August 2003), and urged European cooperation to stop the “brain drain.” This growth of scientific collaboration in Europe is encouraged by the Sixth Research Framework Program, which provides a granting mechanism to support work throughout the EU. The trend toward scientific denationalization will be further manifested in a brand-new all-European science event, which will take place in Stockholm a year from now. EuroScience 2004 is an ambitious plan, reminiscent of the AAAS Annual Meeting sponsored by the nonprofit scientific society that publishes this journal. The deadline for submitted papers is 15 September 2003, and we look for a lively response. All of this is good news, but there are three areas in which more work is needed. Science policy needs to follow science along its transnational course, international cooperation is needed to help solve the brain drain problem, and the further development of a European research entity should include a restructuring of priorities. Regionalization of scientific work is one thing; creating regional science policy may be more difficult. The knowledge needed to suggest a regional policy must come from the scientists of all the involved countries, and regional centers of excellence might provide a structure through which policy matters could be explored on a regionwide basis. The dilemma here is straightforward: Although European science is increasingly carried out as an activity without national borders, science policy is still made by nations. Constructing a thoughtful integration of EU science policy with respect to broad issues (like the desirable balance between basic and applied projects) and narrower ones (like stem cells) is a task worthy of the best efforts of its science leaders. The United States needs not only to welcome the development of a European science union, it should make some moves to help its longer-range needs. The brain drain problem is not new; it received a good deal of attention in the 1960s but slipped beneath notice as European research expenditures grew and laboratories there strengthened. U.S. institutions might well restrain, at least for a time, their temptation to conduct overseas raids to fill permanent positions. Increased international scientific exchange in all directions supports, rather than inhibits, the equitable distribution of talent, and U.S. science and immigration policies should be drawn in ways that facilitate the movement of graduate and postdoctoral scientists in both directions. Right now, they aren't. An increasingly difficult visa situation and the well-publicized political differences between the United States and Europe are impairing scientific exchange. Some pending issues, however, will require a European solution. Widespread dissatisfaction is reported with the division, in the Frameworks Programs, between basic and applied research; there is a wish for more of the former and less of the latter. Further discussions about the formation of a European Research Council, which have been jump-started by just these kinds of dissatisfactions, need to be accompanied by a careful examination of the shape of the research portfolio. [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.301.5633.565

Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic—Unique Opportunities for Unifying, Revamping and Reshaping Epidemic Preparedness of Europe’s Public Health Systems

The EU Response to COVID-19: From Reactive Policies to Strategic Decision-Making.

Eighty-six EU policy options for reducing imported deforestation

Let's face it: The proposal for the sixth European R&D Framework Program by research Commissioner Philippe Busquin[*][1] could have been a lot worse. In fact, if it survives the scrutiny of the Council of Ministers and sails through the European Parliament without too much damage, it will offer substantial benefit for science policy in Europe. These are big ifs, admittedly. For one thing, industry and the business sector do not seem overenthusiastic because they see too much emphasis on basic research. The constituency in the science and engineering community that has become dependent on previous framework programs may feel left out in the cold, and the traditional peddlers of national interest may feel deprived of power to guide the commission in the “right direction.” If the history of the previous programs is any guide, all this may lead to substantial changes in the present proposal during the upcoming wrestling matches between special interest groups. But as it stands, the proposal delivers on the promise of Busquin's vision of a European Research Area (ERA).[†][2] The existing science system in Europe is a collection of jealously guarded national systems, resulting in a lot of waste and undue fragmentation. Europe should spend more public money on science to compete, but it must also use the available financial resources and talent much more effectively than it does now. In formulating the ERA, Busquin demonstrated the urgency of the problem and presented an outline for a solution. The new framework proposal aims to bring this ERA closer to reality. For example, collaboration between national R&D organizations is to be strengthened to overcome the competitive disadvantages of the science system in Europe. The objectives of the Framework Program will thus be reoriented from promoting collaboration among individual scientists to promoting collaboration among research organizations. The ideas are still vague and lack operational specificity, but the opportunity to build on these modest beginnings should be taken up. Collaboration between research councils can take various forms. For example, the European Science Foundation has introduced the EUROCORES mechanism, directed at joint planning and execution of bottom-up research programs.[‡][3] Such concepts should be expanded to include joint planning and investment in research infrastructure. The new plan offers European Union (EU) support for such activities. In doing so, it recognizes the limited ability of the EU's bureaucracy to micromanage programs. Such courageous recognition is a necessary condition for improvement. Industry and commerce should welcome the plan because it is directed at improving the European science system, which will lead to better science and better scientists and engineers. Europe's competitiveness depends on the effective transfer of ideas from generation to commercial application and exploitation in new and existing companies; this transfer in turn depends entirely on the quality of the people we educate and train in our higher education system. Especially in fast-moving areas of science, where the rate of discovery cannot be transmitted in the traditional education chain, it is vital that scientists and engineers have firsthand experience at these new frontiers. Creative and effective application of technology in new products and services must be supported by entrepreneurial skills in recognizing opportunities and marketing products. Science and technology policy, whether at the national or European level, should be directed at creating the conditions to achieve and sustain this dynamic. The present proposal shows that this has been recognized, as it emphasizes the need and promises to support collaboration between science and industry. At the Lisbon summit in March 2000, the EU government leaders requested from the European Commission a proposal for a program that can assist and stimulate the emergence of a creative and entrepreneurial spirit in the European research and innovation system. To achieve that, issues of mobility, patenting, taxation, competition, and collaboration will have to be tackled. Most of these issues are outside the responsibilities of the Commissioner for Research, but the present Framework Program proposal is a step in the right direction. The fate of the proposal in the coming months will be an interesting test of the political commitment to a change in European R&D policy. Let us see what remains by the end of this year. [1]: #fn-1 [2]: #fn-2 [3]: #fn-3

EU plans to boost research

European Union (EU) and global sustainability policies emphasize the need to replace contentious pesticides with safe, efficient, and cost-effective alternatives to ensure sustainable food production. However, R&D for alternatives to contentious pesticides are lagging behind and need to be broadened. Here, we discuss how RNAi-based technology can contribute to pesticide risk reduction.

The 2001 EU Clinical Trials Directive aimed to harmonize the regulation of medical research, but achieved the opposite. Various attempts are underway to update the directive to make it easier to safely conduct medical research in Europe.

Slowly, and with pressure from the scientific community, the structure and mission of a European Research Council begins to develop

New Dimensions of Vulnerability to Energy and Transport Poverty