Europe has to innovate and increase spending on research if it is not to be left behind in the global race to create the most competitive knowledge economy. That was the message from the European Union’s leaders ten years ago. 

A decade later, the talk is very similar, although the tone is less hubristic. The European Union needs to be an “innovation union” to tackle its big health, environmental and resource problems. Even the target is the same: the EU should aim to spend the equivalent of 3% of its output on research and development by 2020.

Research and innovation take centre-stage in Europe’s new economic strategy (Europe 2020), and the ‘innovation’ aspects of the strategy expected to be discussed by national leaders at a summit meeting later this year.

The sense of déjà vu underlines just how far Europe missed the mark the first time round. Today, Europe spends 1.9% of gross domestic product on research and development, compared to 2.6% in the United States and 3.4% in Japan.

Still, there have been some improvements. Public spending on research did increase, but private investment remained static. Several politicians have said that the picture would have been much bleaker if the 3% target had not existed, because research ministers would have struggled to convince their finance departments to maintain or increase spending on research.

Emphasis on education

Maria Da Graça Carvalho, a former science minister of Portugal, believes that Europe 2020 can succeed where previous economic strategies have failed. She argues that the difference is the strong emphasis on education. “It is not enough to invest in research; there has to be absorption capacity in society to turn the research into value,” says Carvalho, who is now a centre-right MEP. Some governments must do more to support higher education, she says, and the EU must finally create a European-wide patent system.

The MEP, a member of the Parliament’s new temporary committee on future spending priorities, promises to fight for an increase in EU spending on research. “We need more public funds for research,” she says, “you can only stop the vicious [economic] cycle with growth. And investment in research and education is the best option.”

Fact File

EU SPENDING ON RESEARCH, 2007-13

€54.5 billion on the EU’s main research programme (FP7).
€49.6bn on research, technology and innovation projects in European regions (structural funds).
€309 million on the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (2008-13).
€4.6bn Marie Curie funds – grants for researchers to work or train in another European country.

Total: €109bn (11.8 % of the EU budget)

Technology trends

The EU’s research spending (which includes contributions from countries outside the EU ) has increased in recent decades (see box).

A less-noticed trend is that the spending has become more dispersed. For instance, the European Commission has charged the European Research Council with distributing €7.5 billion of funds for pioneering research, and put several billion into public-private partnerships – for example, on new medicines development, cleaner aviation and hydrogen-fuel cell technology.

But there is more to promoting European research than providing money. There are still barriers that prevent researchers from working in other European countries. In 2008, the EU agreed a target that all researchers should be able to move easily around Europe by 2020, so that the ‘fifth freedom’ – knowledge – flows as easily as goods, services, people and capital.

But a lot needs to be done to make this a reality. A recent report on the future of the single market by Mario Monti, a former European commissioner, called for more co-ordination of social security systems to help talented people, such as researchers, work in other European countries.

Bringing employment and pensions rules into line will be a sensitive issue for member states. But these tricky issues will need to be resolved if European leaders are to avoid repeating the same lines in ten years’ time.

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