ECA: National initiative ‘key’ to bridge innovation gap in EU

The Commission’s support is not a panacea, it can only act as a catalyst for change, the European Court of Auditors notes.

It is well known that the gap between Member States in research and innovation (R&D) is real and persistent. In order to give lagging countries the opportunity to show their potential, the European Commission implements special measures known as “enlargement measures”. With these measures, it seeks to improve the access of these countries to key EU financial instruments.

However, in a report published today, the European Court of Auditors notes that the key to real progress lies largely in the hands of national governments, which must put R&D at the top of their agenda if they are to stimulate investment. and accelerate reforms. Enlargement measures are just the beginning: they alone are not strong enough to bring about the necessary changes in the national R & D ecosystems.

Participation in the EU’s multiannual research and innovation programs is based on excellence. This means that only the best proposals are selected. As a result, researchers and innovators from low-performing countries, ie those with less developed R&D ecosystems, face difficulties when it comes to competing with their counterparts from better-performing countries. This reduces their chances of securing participation in the programs, which in turn limits their countries’ ability to cover their deficits in this area. In order to break this vicious circle, the EU introduced measures to expand participation in the Horizon 2020 financing program, which covered the period 2014-2020. These measures targeted the 13 countries that joined the EU in 2004, as well as Luxembourg and Portugal.

“If we want to harness the EU’s potential and bridge the gap between innovation pioneers and tailors, researchers from all over the EU must be able to benefit from its funding programs,” said Ivana Maletić. , Member of the European Court of Auditors and responsible for the report. “The Commission is helping low-performing countries to make up for lost ground, but its support is not a panacea: it can only act as a catalyst for change. In order to break the vicious circle, Member States must assume their responsibilities. . ”

The auditors concluded that the enlargement measures served their purpose, as they combated the causes of low performance and limited participation of some Member States in successive Union R&D programs. However, they are critical of the fact that enlargement projects have been concentrated in a small number of countries. This concentration carries the risk of perpetuating the vicious circle, as once again some of the countries targeted by the measures benefited much less from them. The auditors are asking the Commission to refrain from outsourcing most projects to a small group of countries and to take steps to expand participation when permanent, significant imbalances arise.

However, the determining factor that judges a country’s performance is the level of national investment in R&D and the reforms it promotes in this area. In 2020, the average rate of R&D investment in the EU was 2.3% of GDP, which is lower than the 3% target. Of the 15 countries involved in expanding participation, only Slovenia and the Czech Republic invested more than 2%. In addition, not all countries made use of the Policy Support Mechanism (MIP), one of the policy instruments provided by the Commission to help them push for national reforms. Member States were free to decide whether and how to implement the Commission’s recommendations under this mechanism. Therefore, the MYP’s potential for change was minimal. However, the Commission used the knowledge gained from the MYP activities when evaluating the various R&D countries. These evaluations are carried out in the context of the annual economic and fiscal policy coordination cycle known as the “European Semester”.

Most of the participation expansion projects have not yet been completed and, therefore, their full impact will not be felt until the coming years. However, the auditors found that the first encouraging results were already beginning to emerge, for example in terms of the number of scientific publications, networking and greater access to grants. On the other hand, there were many problems, as the projects encountered difficulties in their efforts to secure the necessary additional funding in a timely manner, to attract international researchers, and, above all, to generate revenue in order to become sustainable. The auditors analyzed two measures aimed at achieving long-term results for the beneficiaries: the “Teaming” measure, which supports centers of excellence, and the “European Research Area (ERA) Chairs” measure (ERA Chairs), which seeks to attract distinguished academics to research institutes. Based on their analysis, they concluded that the beneficiaries of these measures had only limited opportunities to use their research results.

General information

Since 1984, the EU has funded research and innovation through successive Framework Programs, such as Horizon 2020 (covering € 2014-2020 and allocating € 76.4 billion) and Horizon Europe (covering period 2021-2027 and has 95.5 billion euros). The low performance of some countries in this area, as well as their limited participation in Horizon 2020, are attributed, inter alia, to the inadequacy of national R&D ecosystems (characterized, for example, by fragmented governance or limited investment), human capital (due to the “brain drain”) and the limited internationalization of R&D institutions. The aim of the measures to expand participation was to strengthen the capacity of research institutes in these Member States, by providing support for them to network, establish partnerships with leading institutions and attract highly skilled workers. The budget of these measures amounted to 935 million euros, in the period 2014-2020, under the “Horizons 2020” program and to 2.95 billion euros, in the period 2021-2027, under the “Horizons Europe” program. All Member States designated as “Extending Countries” under Horizon 2020 have maintained this status under Horizon Europe, with the exception of Luxembourg, which has been replaced by Greece.

The special report 15/2022, entitled “Proper planning of measures to expand participation in Horizon 2020 is not enough: achieving sustainable change will depend mainly on the efforts of national authorities”, is available on the ECA website ( Within the year, the ECA will publish a special report on the synergies between Horizon 2020 and the European Structural and Investment Funds.