Videos
21.06.2021: "Global Cooperation in Research, Innovation, and education: the EU Perspective" webinar.
(Recorded live stream)
See PowerPoint presentations HERE
13.11.2020: "EU-programmes – Discover the opportunities for the public sector" event
(Recorded live stream)
Calendar
University of Bergen’s Arqus team, assembled in October 2020, the first and to date only physical meeting of the team (some members of the team, that counts 60 persons, are absent from this picture). Photo credit: Arqus/University of Bergen
European Universities: Council Conclusions and Perspectives from a Norwegian
Partner
By Iben Dahl
The European Council on 17 May adopted conclusions on the European Universities initiative - Bridging higher education, research, innovation, and society: paving the way for a new
dimension in European higher education. With it, the Council designates the European
Universities an important role to reach the EU's research, innovation, and education objectives.
What does it mean in practice?
Let's turn back the clock a few years. The European Universities initiative responds to the
Council's conclusions from December 2017, when it was agreed that member states, the
Council and the Commission should strengthen "strategic partnerships across the EU higher
education institutions and [encourage] the emergence by 2024 of some twenty 'European
Universities". Hence, European Universities are bottom-up networks of universities across the EU, that will enable students to obtain degrees by combining studies from across EU countries, effectively boosting the international competitiveness of these universities.
The Innovation Speech 2021
- A lot is happening, and it happens now. We have a solid basis; but a solid basis is not
enough.
This was how Innovation Norway's CEO Håkon Haugli summed up the status for innovation and exports in Norway in the 2021 edition of the annual Innovation Speech. A main message was that crisis has spurred extraordinary innovation and transition:
"The crisis year 2020 brought us more, not fewer, enterprises, Haugli pointed out.
Among these, many have digital and green components, Haugli said, and moved to cite how plans for a green transition have been developed in both the US, in Asia, and in the EU through the Green Deal, posing substantial market opportunities for Norwegian comparative advantages. Haugli cited Norwegian know-how within oil and gas, strong renewable sectors within hydro, wind and solar PV, and a pioneering role within electrification of transports.
European Science Associations Call for
Swiss Full Association to Horizon
Europe
15 European STI councils, advisory bodies, and other science organisations in an open letter call for the EU to include Switzerland as a fully associated country to Horizon Europe, the EU's €95.5 billion framework R&I programme. Switzerland, like Norway, has participated in the EU's R&I framework
programmes since the 1980s.
Citing the country's substantial scientific resources, the signatories warn that a degradation of Switzerland to a Third Country would "(…)severely limit its expertise being brought into Horizon Europe projects tackling today’s and tomorrow’s global challenges". Moreover, considering both an increasingly more multipolar world in
which global competition in R&I is surging, and the challenges posed by Covid-19 and climate change, Europe should "stand together and unite its forces". The rejection of Switzerland as a fully associated member more generally would impede on the
strength of the European Research Area
(ERA) as a whole, they say.
Norwegian Parliament Approves
Proposal to Join Erasmus+ and Horizon Europe in 2021-27
25 May 2021
The Norwegian Parliament on 25 May
formally decided that Norway will participate in Horizon Europe, the world's biggest programme for research and innovation, and Erasmus+, the EU's programme for education, training, youth, and sport.
The approvals succeed two respective
proposals by the Norwegian Government in April, when it was agreed to apply for inclusion in the programmes through the EEA agreement, which regulates Norwegian
participation in the EU's programmes.
As to the R&I programme Horizon Europe, the projects that include Norwegian participants have a total value of more than 100 billion NOK and will provide Norwegian agents with access to research and innovation that exceeds the Norwegian fee more than seven times. Meanwhile, Erasmus+ is the world's biggest education
programme, and enables mobility and
cooperation in education across all stages of the course of education.