Welcoming the deal, Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science Máire Geoghegan-Quinn said: "The vote today by the European Parliament was a vote for a modern, future-oriented budget that puts more emphasis than ever on research and innovation. The budget increase of 30% for Horizon 2020 over the previous programme is a vote of confidence in the power of EU research and innovation funding. This means we can provide more grants for fundamental research, for instance through the European Research Council. We can support more innovative businesses in bringing good ideas to market.  And we can do more to tackle global challenges like climate change and public health."

The Commission's press release explains the deal here: http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-13-1096_en.htm. The European Parliament still has to vote on the actual Horizon 2020 programme.  This vote is expected on Thursday, with the debate in the Parliament's plenary on Wednesday afternoon.

Explaining the budget figures:

The total budget for Horizon 2020 is €79 billion in current prices and €70.2 billion in constant (2011) prices.

Current prices are the amount that will be effectively requested to the budget authority each year. Therefore, current prices include the inflation effect.  Constant prices exclude totally the inflation effect and “fix” all amounts at the value of a certain year. For the budget negotiations, this was fixed at 2011 prices.  The original Commission proposal for Horizon 2020 was €80 billion in constant 2011 prices.  We received €70.2 in 2011 prices in the final budget deal earlier this year.

For more info see: http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-13-1004_en.htm

Or visit the Horizon 2020 info site: http://ec.europa.eu/research/horizon2020/index_en.cfm  

Contacts:

Michael Jennings, Tel. +32 229 633 88 Twitter: @ECSpokesScience

Inmaculada Martinez Garcia Tel. +32 229 873 03