The European Union is a world leader in research and innovation, responsible for 24% of world expenditure on research, 32% of high impact publications and 32% of patent applications, while representing only 7% of the population.

EU research programmes are open to participation from across the globe. Currently, 6% of participants in the Seventh Framework Programme for Research (FP7) come from third countries. The Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions, that fund mobility and training for researchers, support participants from 80 different countries. The European Research Council (ERC), which funds researchers from anywhere in the world to do cutting-edge research in Europe, has begun a campaign to attract more participants from third countries. The Commission's in-house science service, the Joint Research Centre (JRC), also maintains close research links to organisations around the world.

The new strategy will follow a dual approach. Through the general opening up of Horizon 2020 to international cooperation, European researchers will be free to cooperate with their third country counterparts on topics of their own choice. This will be complemented by targeted activities, where cooperation will be sought on particular topics and with well identified partners. The strategy will also promote common international principles in research and innovation, such as on research integrity, gender awareness and open access, in order to provide the global research and innovation community with a level playing field in international cooperation. The strategy also aims at having research and innovation contribute in a stronger way to the Union's external policies. The Commission will report on progress every two years.

Research is a shared competence with the Member States. A strong partnership will be ensured by building on the work of the Strategic Forum for International Science and Technology Cooperation (SFIC).

More information available at: http://ec.europa.eu/research/iscp/index.cfm?lg=en&pg=strategy

Source: http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/12/967&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en