Irish Regions Office Website

April 23, 2010

Innovation DG reaches out

The cross-cutting nature of innovation has been recognised by the announcement of an intention to establish a sub-group of ten EU Commissioners from different fields with a stake in and influence upon EU innovation policy. The move, formally tabled at the meeting of the College of Commissioners on 18 April having been suggested in January, is an acknowledgment that Research, Innovation and Science Commissioner Maire Geogheghan-Quinn's newly-created portfolio will require the support of counterparts in various other policy areas in order to devise the new broad-based European 'Research and Innovation Plan' in time for the autumn summit of European leaders.

Under the previous Commission, innovation policy was split among numerous separate DGs. Its recent streamlining as a responsibility under DG Research brought with it a risk of becoming unresponsive to developments across a range of themes which this initiative is seeking to counter by opening itself to outside influences. The most prominent of the current Commission portfolios expected to be involved in the new committee are Industry & Entrepreneurship, Competition, Transport, Digital Agenda, and Energy and - to a lesser extent - Internal Market & Services, Regional Policy, Education, and Employment, Social Affairs & Inclusion.

Commissioner Geogheghan-Quinn is also believed to want the group to shape the debate on how to reliably measure the effectiveness of EU spending on R&D as a means of assuring economic growth. This is necessary in order to allay fears at Member State level that an all-round 3% of GDP research spend (the Commission's target, agreed to in principle by national leaders at their March summit) would not represent an inefficient use of resources.

This is the largest and most advanced of the horizontal 'Commissioners' groups' proposed by Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso. Others are being outlined to cover the EU's future budget (2014-2020), External Relations, Internal Market, Industrial Policy, Digital Agenda, Climate Change, Pensions, and Innovative Financial Instruments.

Posted by iroronan at April 23, 2010 11:05 AM