eap-plus.eu – STI International Cooperation Network for Eastern Partnership Countries - PLUS

Future Cooperation

Task 1.3: Shaping the future of the EU – EaP STI cooperation

Policy stakeholders as well as science and innovation communities in the EU and the EaP countries are most interested in exploiting the full potential of the cooperation in STI between the two regions, aiming at a shared borderless knowledge. A White Paper (see footnote) prepared within the EU project IncoNet EECA in 2012, has provided a knowledge-base on the state of affairs of STI policies as well as opportunities in view of enhancing the EU cooperation with Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and South Caucasus in Science, Technology and Innovation. It has also identified a series of challenges and recommendations on strengthening the EU-EECA STI cooperation, many of which have been implemented in some countries.

In addition, in four out of the six EaP countries (MD/2012 and 2016; AM/2015; GE/2015; UKR/2016) Policy Mix Peer Reviews (PMPR) have been implemented under the “IncoNet EECA” and “IncoNet EaP” and other EU programmes by high-level experts from EU MS/AC aiming to enhance the STI capabilities of the countries.

Taking into consideration of all the aforementioned activities and recent developments, there is a need to review the status of the cooperation and, moreover, to set new goals for the EU-EaP STI cooperation and tools for their implementation. In that respect the two following activities are being implemented:

Activity 1.3.a: Fact-finding activities for the EaP countries

During the last years, several countries of the EaP region have launched a great number of activities to strengthen their RTDI system. As a consequence, this dynamics should be closely followed. Therefore, fact-finding activities have been implemented in the EaP countries which will eventually feed the Recommendations for the future of the EU-EaP STI cooperation (Activity 1.3.b).

Activity 1.3.b: STI policy recommendations ‘EU-EaP beyond 2020’

This task will make the synthesis of the results of the policy dialogue activities (Tasks 1.1 and 1.2), of the fact-finding activities, as well as of all the other EaP PLUS project activities. In addition, this task will review the state of implementation of the recommendations of the White Paper developed in 2012 and the results of other projects and initiatives targeting the region, as well as other (broader) EU policies and trends.

As a result, STI policy recommendations will be developed taking into account the current EU STI strategy in order to solidly root the recommendations to it.

The ‘EU-EaP beyond 2020’ report will constitute one of the main deliverables of the project. It will be presented at the final dissemination Conference (Task 5.4). In addition, a printed and online version will be promoted and disseminated among different EU and EaP panels (Task 1.1) as well as at events with policy stakeholders and representatives of the EU and EaP scientific communities.


[1] “White Paper on Opportunities and Challenges in View of Enhancing the EU Cooperation with Eastern Europe, Central Asia and South Caucasus in Science, Research and Innovation”, IncoNet EECA, Athens, 2012, accessible in http://www.ceriss.eu/files/White_Paper_main_for_web.pdf

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