Future of EU research institution taking shape

STRASBOURG: Parliament’s decision to focus the European institute of technology on innovation above all is the key to its likely success, says Reino Paasilinna.

The Finnish rapporteur, whose report on the EIT was passed with widespread support by parliament’s industry committee on Monday night, told this website that there was no need for the proposed institution to repeat what was already happening elsewhere in Europe.

“We have a multitude of existing bodies and programmes working in the area of research – the European research centre, the joint research council, FP7 – and we have to make sure that creating an EIT does not hamper their growth,” said Paaslinna.

“Innovation is Europe’s Achilles heel, and it should be our main objective to increase our innovation capacity.”

“We need more innovation to remain globally competitive and to guarantee growth in jobs. The EIT could help us to realise that goal.”

Paasilinna’s report differs considerably from the initial idea put forward by European commission president José Manuel Barroso last year as a flagship project that would show European citizens what Europe could do for them.

Barroso’s grandiose plans for an MIT-style campus-based European university, with a network of “knowledge communities” linked to it across the EU, has fallen by the wayside.

“The EIT as a ‘seat’ should have between 60 and 100 permanent employees at the most, including a board of directors drawn from academia, business and elsewhere,” said Paasilinna.

“But the knowledge communities – universities, research organisations, companies and other stakeholders – that I now call knowledge and innovation communities, or KICs, would not be part of the EIT itself, but would be separate independent projects focusing on key areas of innovation.”

These, he said, could include work on issues such as climate change and renewable energy sources, but also areas with more immediate economic impact such as next-generation ICT projects.

KICs would apply for EU funding – through the EIT but also from other national government sources and from industry – in order to avoid eating too heavily into money set aside for FP7, the ERC and other existing bodies, the Finn said.

“Although they will be able to apply for funding from FP7 and other instruments, KICs should not be given privileged access to the money.”

“And the EIT’s organisation should be funded solely from the agreed budget of €308.7m, not from other budget lines such as FP7.”

The focus on innovation, he suggested, would also help plug the funding gap for the EIT, which was proposed after the EU agreed its funding for the next seven years.

The EIT is expected to cost a total of €2.4bn in its first six years - until the new EU funding period begins in 2014 - and most of this will come from money already agreed but allocated to a specific area, as well as from national research funding and businesses.

It will be up to the EIT governing board to decide exactly how to define innovation, Paasilinna said, and to ensure that KICs were focused on this rather than on more general research.

But he refused to be drawn on suggestions that the EIT – as Barroso’s flagship  project – should have a well-known figurehead to raise the profile of research and innovation.

“There is certainly scope for someone like this at the head of the EIT, but I do not wish to comment on who that person might be.”
 
 He also underscored the fact that the EIT will not be a campus-style university – and that it was therefore unlikely to be a possible replacement for the European parliament in Strasbourg.

“The EIT will be there to encourage innovation at universities and elsewhere, but it would be the research establishments themselves that would issue the degrees – the EIT will give a ‘seal of approval’ to them.”

And while Paasilinna welcomed the fact that several member states were lining up to host to the EIT when it is finally created, he warned that the nature of the institution would limit the choice of where it is based.

“It must be in somewhere that is easily accessible, so that it will encourage communication between the EIT and KICs.”

He warned that putting it somewhere like Parma – where the European food safety agency is based – or Thessaloniki – home of the network security agency – would be counterproductive.

“These places are difficult to reach, and I would urge governments not use the seat of the EIT as a political tool, leaving it somewhere on Europe’s periphery,” he said.

The Polish town of Wroclaw has been mooted as a potential home for the EIT – and was being offered as a carrot to the Polish government ahead of last month’s EU summit.

The aim was to offer the EIT to Poland in a bid to force Warsaw to soften its negotiating stance on council voting rights, and Paasilinna is concerned that the EIT could again be used as a political football.

Paasilinna is confident that his report will win the backing of the full parliament at the second plenary session in September, and expects to see the support of both the commission and member states.

“I have spoken with [education commissioner] Jan Figel and he broadly welcomes the decision to focus on innovation, even if the separate legal entity status for the KICs was not what the commission had hoped for.”

“But our position is close to that of council and commission, and I expect to see an agreement in September, with the work starting in January on the creation of the EIT management board.”

 

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