European Working Group of Innovation Consultants stresses the role of innovation for a successful EU recovery

The Multi-Annual Financial Framework (MFF) 2021-2027 is undergoing intense negotiations within the European Institutions. Horizon Europe’s budget has been decreased by 5 billion euros, straying away from the European Commission’s initial ambitious plan. The European Council and Parliament (EP) have just a few months left to complete their negotiations.

EWGIC, the European Working Group of Innovation Consultants, welcomes the European Council’s agreement on the MFF and the Next Generation EU budgets but regrets the treatment of European research and innovation funding especially related to Horizon Europe.

Pieter Liese, MEP, commented on Wednesday, that “the European Parliament must play a much stronger role in the recovery plan.”  In this context of uncertainty that surrounds the MFF and Horizon Europe budgets, EWGIC has published a Position Paper to voice the views of EU consultants and to urge the EP to strengthen Europe’s recovery through innovation, specifically through Horizon Europe.

The pandemic has shown that resilience needs Research and Innovation. It is time for Europe to show its support for the sector that can guide it out of the crisis. Now it is also time for decisionmakers to finalize the budget deal on a programme level. EWGIC calls for a swift decision on Horizon Europe’s internal budget so that the programme implementation can be finished, and the programme launched without delays at the beginning of 2021.

Industry-led collaborative projects and European Partnerships, where industry and academia together solve European citizens most important problems, should be one of the main priorities of Horizon Europe, to ensure that the results of excellent Research and Innovation beneficiate to all of them.

Read and download EWGIC’s Position Paper here.