Commission emphasises commitment to innovation in regional policy
Three European Commissioners restated their commitment to making the EU's regional cohesion policy work towards the Lisbon goals of growth, jobs and competitiveness at the 'Regions for economic change' conference in Brussels on 12 June. The commissioners and the conference focused on the role of local and regional actors, as well as EU regional policy, in fostering innovation and meeting the challenges of globalisation in the poorest regions of Europe. Commission President José Manuel Barroso opened the conference by declaring, 'the close relationship between cohesion policy and the renewed strategy for growth should come as no surprise,' as cohesion policy has always targeted regions' needs for growth and jobs. He went on to point out that Europe still lags behind its partners and competitors in both public and private investment in research and innovation. While some consider that investments in cohesion and innovation are an 'either/or choice', he stated, 'nothing could be further from the truth'. 'The European Commission and its Member States have recognised that growth and jobs can only be delivered through the successful involvement of regional actors,' Mr Barroso continued. He welcomed the initiative of the conference in bringing such actors together in order to address creating the right environment for innovation, strengthening public and private collaboration, and establishing partnerships and synergies. Danuta Hübner, the Commissioner responsible for regional policy, continued this theme in her own opening speech, saying, 'we want to see that [research and innovation] feature much more strongly in the investment strategies advanced by the Structural Funds'. Regional innovation strategies need to experiment with funding in order to investigate new approaches, she said, and implement successful initiatives more widely and on a larger scale. 'The key question is how can actors at the local and regional level help to meet the challenge of globalisation,' Ms Hübner told the conference. While the Commission sets a strategic programming framework to deliver growth and jobs, EU regional policy is unique in that 'it is the stakeholders in the Member States, regions and cities who flesh out the strategy, select projects and are responsible for implementing them successfully'. In working to develop cohesion between regional, research and innovation policies, the European Commission's strategic guidance to Member States recommends using cohesion funding to support regional and trans-regional innovative clusters. However, Ms Hübner also stated some early conclusions of the Commission's ongoing strategic evaluation of knowledge and innovation in regional policies and programmes. These include the necessity of regions having a differentiated innovation strategy based on an analysis of their current situation, and the need for both public and private stakeholders to be involved in both the strategy and its implementation. Both Mr Barroso and Ms Hübner believed that regions have a key role to play in delivering concrete benefits to the daily lives of EU citizens. Their particular competences and their closeness to citizens make them key players in building understanding and confidence in Europe itself, it was said. Speaking later at a press briefing, Ms Hübner emphasised that refocusing the Structural Funds on innovation was not only about technology, but also services and new ways of doing things. 'Innovation is taking a new idea and converting it into results,' she said. Later in the day, Vice-President of the European Commission and Commissioner for Enterprise and Industry, Günter Verheugen, also agreed that in an open global economy, competitive advantage will only come through the application of knowledge. 'There will always be someone cheaper than us,' he said, 'we can only compete on a quality front'. The problem is not that we have become less innovative, Mr Verheugen warned, but rather that the others have caught up, and Europe now faces serious competition in innovative sectors, such as pharmaceuticals, where once we led. He said that businesses are more mobile in today's global economy and they will move to where workers are well trained, research and development (R&D) is strong and innovative clusters exist. The conference included workshops on such themes as innovative clusters, knowledge management, venture capital, innovation infrastructure and the role of public authorities. It is the first of three conferences with the theme of 'regions for economic change', with the second and third planned for December 2006 and February 2007. These will lead up to the fourth Cohesion Forum, which will be held in June 2007. On the same day Mrs Hübner emphasised how much work remains to be done, when she presented the fourth progress report on cohesion. The report provides a snapshot of economic and social disparities in the EU and reviews progress over the past year in tackling them. She said, 'today's report reveals worrying disparities in modern infrastructure, research and education which limit our capacity for excellence and innovation. Regional policy will continue to play a vital role over the next decade in closing these gaps and helping the European economy to fulfil its true potential.' The Structural Funds are the financial instrument of the EU's cohesion policy and its second largest budget. In the next programming period, 2007-2013, the agreed budget of EUR 308 billion has been simplified into three funding schemes: - Convergence (addressing the poorest regions, with GDP less than 75 per cent of the EU average), where 60 per cent of funding should be targeted at the priorities of the Lisbon strategy; - Competitiveness, where 75 per cent is to be tied to Lisbon; - Territorial cooperation.