With a series of key decisions, the European Union has given emphasis to strengthening R&D cooperation with neighbouring countries, especially those that may become members of the Union in the near or mid-term future (as it is the case of the Western Balkans). The development of Science and Technology (S&T) collaboration provides important opportunities to all sectors of economy and may serve as a first step to political cooperation within a wider context of European integration. It is now necessary to undertake coherent actions for the reinforcement of the RTD capacity in each country and in the region as a whole. The new 2007-2013 EU programming period focuses much more than in the past on supporting investment in innovation, research and entrepreneurship strategies. A lot of tools can be implemented in order to deal with urgent needs for stronger national strategies which foster RTD development and innovation, the establishment of new funding instruments, specific support actions and the development of stronger synergies between national RTD programmes and different EU programmes: 7th EU Framework Programme (FP7, with a budget of 54.582 million euro), Competitiveness Innovation Programme (CIP, with a budget of 3.620 million euro), the Instrument of Pre-accession Assistance (IPA), and other EU programmes where participation of the Western Balkans is foreseen (e.g. TEMPUS, COST, EUREKA, LIFE+, Erasmus Mundus, Life Long Learning Programme). The table summarises the opportunities available in WBC in S&T and Innovation.

The Western Balkan countries should furthermore invest in stakeholders clubs and informal and formal networks aimed at:

• Analysing and answering the needs of the public in an approach combining demand and supply elements;
• Increasing public-private partnerships (PPP) both at the strategic planning phase and in the implementation phase through private money leveraging mechanisms;
• Investing in awareness campaigns in order to better inform all potential beneficiaries of the competitive advantages resulting from networking and clustering activities;
• Making coaching and investment readiness schemes available in order to ensure that any beneficiary of the support has developed the management capacity allowing him/her to efficiently use the support granted.

Regarding applied RTD, activities can be implemented through:

• co-financing of research infrastructures and equipments;
• stimulating partnerships between SMEs and universities or research centres;
• funding a university-enterprise interface;
• opening research facilities to SMEs, for instance by providing “consultancy vouchers” to SMEs to buy services from academics and researchers;
• improving human capacities in universities, research centres and enterprises to be able to produce and use new knowledge which can be transformed into products/services;
• promoting networking and the creation of a critical mass of competences in the field of applied research and exploitation of research results;
• supporting research revenue schemes through an integrated approach including a proof of concept element.

Investment could also focus on a regional skill observatory aimed at:

• detecting the future needs of enterprises;
• influencing the vocational training offer to the foreseen skills requirements of the regional vision;
• promoting entrepreneurship education;
• providing eLearning infrastructure and content;
• using the Life Long Learning Programme (especially Leonardo programme) and Interreg IV to support transnational activities and economic intelligence.

Finally, it is worth stressing that successful strategies all have in common: efficient governance, strong leadership, well-managed support to innovation and research results valorisation, an offer of added-value support services, strong entrepreneurship culture, and “no nonsense” implementation schemes. This means that the strategy tries to eliminate market failures without creating public failures.

Article published in see-science.eu eJournal fall/winter 2007.