Highs and lows for the EU’s R&I programme

Gains in collaboration come with warnings for the future

Science ministers from the G7 group of the world’s richest democracies shared warm words in Italy this month, reaffirming, as EU research and innovation commissioner Iliana Ivanova put it afterwards, a “shared commitment to promote progress in R&I, aligned with the principles of openness, security, freedom and integrity”. With Ivanova—who also attended the event—stressing the need to “foster stronger collaboration among like-minded countries”, it has been encouraging to see two positive moves on this in relation to the EU’s R&I framework programme.

The first, the Commission asking EU governments to allow the start of formal talks on Singapore joining the current programme, Horizon Europe, marks the latest step towards the programme’s greater internationalisation. Singapore, like recent recruits Canada and New Zealand, and almost-there South Korea, is eyeing the programme’s second pillar, focused on societal challenges and industrial competitiveness. The move is even more welcome after the news that talks with Australia have—for now at least—ended without association.