Presented during the Ministerial Round Table on Science and Higher Education. From Bilateral to pan-European Cooperation held over 21-22 May 2010 in Tirana, Albania

1. SEE Expert Meeting and Ministerial Round Table
Strengthening Scientific Research and Higher Education:
from bilateral to panEuropean cooperation
Session 2: Participation of SEE countries in European and
International Research Programmes
SEE COUNTRIES’ PERFORMANCE IN
ESF PROGRAMMES AND IN OTHER
CROSS-BORDER COLLABORATIVE
RESEARCH INITIATIVES
Vanessa Campo-Ruiz, MD PhD
Science Officer to the Chief Executive
European Science Foundation
www.esf.org
Tirana, 21 May 2010 1

2. INDEX
1. The ESF and the SEE Countries: who is who
2. SEE Countries Performance in EUROCORES
Programme
3. Collaboration between European research
organisations: a survey conducted by ESF
www.esf.org
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3. The European Science Foundation
Independent, non-governmental
organisation established in 1974
• 30 countries
• 79 Member Organisations
Research Funding Organisations
Research Performing Organisations
Academies and Learned Societies
A common platform to collaborate across
all scientific domains and geographical
www.esf.org boundaries
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4. ESF Committees and their Units
Standing Committee domains
• Humanities
• Social Sciences
• Life, Earth & Environmental
Sciences
• Medical Sciences
• Physical and Engineering
Sciences
Expert Board/Committee domains
• Marine Sciences • Nuclear Physics
• Polar Sciences • Materials Science and
• Space Sciences Engineering
• Radio Astronomy
www.esf.org
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5. ESF Member Organisations
Our 79 MOs include
11 Member
Organisations from
6 SEE Countries:
Croatia (HAZU and NZZ),
Romania (CNCSIS),
Slovenia (ARRS, SAZU and
SZF)
Bulgaria (BAS and NSFB),
Greece (NHRF and FORTH)
and Turkey (TUBITAK).
www.esf.org
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6. ESF Instruments
STRATEGY IMPLEMENTATION
Exploratory Workshops Research Conferences
Science Policy Briefings Research Networking
Programmes
Forward Looks
EUROCORES
Member Organisation Fora
www.esf.org
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7. EUROCORES
European Collaborative Research Programmes
• The single, Europe-wide research programme scheme
with a bottom-up approach (theme-wise), covering all
scientific disciplines.
• Themes are proposed by scientists and assessed by ESF
Scientific Advisory Board. Applications undergo international
peer review, coordinated by ESF.
• Research funding remains national. No common pot:
research teams are funded by their national organisations.
• Networking is funded by MOs, and coordinated by ESF
(funded by EC until 2008).
• Currently, 52 programmes “open” with 23 of them at the
networking phase, involving 66 funding organisations and
over 1,000 researchers , and a total funding of 161,2 M€
total (triannual).
www.esf.org
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8. EUROCORES
Applicants/ Research Teams from
Beneficiaries Universities and
Research Organisations
Teams 30
Countries 3 or more
Duration 3-4 years
www.esf.org
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9. HOW ARE SEE COUNTRIES
PERFORMING IN THE
EUROCORES PROGRAMME?
www.esf.org
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10. EUROCORES
An opportunity to collaborate beyond ESF membership
SEE EUROCORES Preferred partners Collaboration
COUNTRY 2001-2007 w/ other SEE
(*)
BULGARIA 35 NL (5), FR (5),DE (4) Turkey (2),
Greece (1)
CROATIA 7 NL (2), DE (2), UK (2) ---
GREECE 59 NL (9), ES (8) , FR (8) Bulgaria (1)
ROMANIA 58 DE (11), NL (8), CH (8) Turkey (6)
SERBIA 10 DE (2), FR (2) ---
SLOVENIA 16 UK (4), DE (3) ---
TURKEY 165 DE (35), NL (23), CH Romania (6),
(14) Bulgaria (2)
* Number of collaborative links enabled through EUROCORES between researchers from 2001 to
2007 in funded collaborative research programmes (as Project Leaders; Principal Investigators;
or Associated Partners).
www.esf.org
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11. Programmes vs publications (data from ISI WOK)
SEE COUNTRY EUROCORES PUBLICATIONS
2001-2007 2001-2007
BULGARIA 35 16.641
CROATIA 7 16.305
GREECE 59 70.240
ROMANIA 58 25.726
SERBIA 10 9.546
SLOVENIA 16 17.015
TURKEY 165 >100.000
ALBANIA -- 460
BOSNIA -- 934
HERZEGOVINA
FYR MACEDONIA -- 2.435
MONTENEGRO -- 419
MOLDOVA -- 1.707
www.esf.org
KOSOVO -- 68 11

12. HOW DO SEE COUNTRIES
PERFORM GLOBALLY
IN ALL CROSS-BORDER
COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH?
RESULTS FROM
ESF SURVEY
www.esf.org
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13. Background of ESF Survey
• In 2009, realising the insufficient data on collaboration
between European research organisations outside the EC
Framework Programmes, ESF was invited to conduct a
survey.
• Sample= 40 Research Funding Organisations (RFOs)
and Research Performing Organisations (RPOs).
www.esf.org
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14. The objective of the Survey was to map the cross-border
collaboration between RFOs and RPOs, identifying
successful models and bottlenecks.
This information is important because these organisations
together manage most of the research funds in Europe.
This information is timely at the advent of Joint
Programming in Europe, for these organisations are
expected to join forces in funding this major initiative.
www.esf.org
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15. SURVEY SAMPLE
40 organisations in 25 countries
• 28 are RFOs Countries of responding organisations
• 10 are RPOs
• 2 are mixed
4 SEE COUNTRIES
RESPONDED:
• Slovenia (ARRS is RFO)
• Romania (CNCSIS is RFO)
• Greece (NHRF is RPO)
• Turkey (TUBITAK is mixed)
Research Research
Funding Performing Mixed
Organisation Organisation
www.esf.org
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16. SAMPLE:
Heterogeneity of organisations
CONCEPT
• RFOs: councils: award competitive grants
• RPOs: run institutes and use ear-marked money
funding permanent positions
• Mixed concept (e.g. MRC in UK, or TUBITAK in Turkey)
FINANCES
• Budget of organisation: 3.200 – 10 M€
• Budget share European collaboration: 47% to ~ zero
www.esf.org
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17. METHODOLOGY
40 organisations replied to a
questionnaire on:
• Formal cooperation agreements
• Implementation of EUROHORCs Money-Follows-
Researchers agreement
• Other means to allow grant to follow researcher
• Participation in joint programmes
– Jointly performed/funded programmes?
– Common pots?
– Career advancement/personnel exchange programmes?
• Are schemes open for researchers based
abroad?
• Procedural issues, legal obstacles
• International joint publications
• Any new developments, aims, priorities
www.esf.org
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18. Main findings (1 of 3)
• Relative budget for European collaboration is
independent of ”absolute research budget”
– Highest relative budget, amongst them some with
relatively small total budgets: PL, GR, NL, LU, SE
• Cross-border collaboration agreements
– Champions: FR, DE, IT, Nordic countries, UK
– Multi-lateral collaborations: via D-A-CH, NORDFORSK,
ESF
– Money-Follows-Researcher agreement
• 20/42 have signed
• 8/20 have signed but not implemented
• Implementors: D-A-CH countries (DE, A, CH), Flemish
BE, LU
www.esf.org • Case-by-case implementors: DE, SE, UK
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19. Main findings (2 of 3)
• Cross-border funding: flexible when linked to
joint programmes, particularly if managed
through a reliable ”handling agent” such as ESF.
Not so flexible for individual projects.
• Procedural issues: ample experience in joint
handling of programmes, peer review and decision
making. The majority are bilateral
collaborations, but multilateral are increasing.
www.esf.org
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20. Main findings (3 of 3)
• Cooperation agreements beyond Europe
– Champions: DE, ES, FI, FR, IT
– Mostly with China and USA
• Cross-border cooperation between individual
researchers: no databases are in place, but the trend
seems to be to collaborate most within Europe, mostly
with France, Germany and the UK.
• Demands from researchers:
– more funds for cross-border collaborations,
– more international mobility and collaboration in
doctoral and postdoctoral training,
– larger use of international infrastructures to enable
long-term cross-border collaborations.
www.esf.org
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21. ESF IS ASSESSING THE IMPACT OF
INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATIONS
ESF MEMBER ORGANISATION FORA FOR:
MO Fora are science policy discussion platforms
• Evaluation of Funding Schemes and Research
..Programmes (2007-2009)
• Science in Society Relationships (2010-2012)
• Evaluation of Publicly Funded Research (2010-2012)
• Evaluation: Indicators of Internationalisation (2009-
..2011)
• Joint Foresight for Joint Programmes (under preparation)
www.esf.org
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22. FINAL REMARKS
Research assessment now focuses on “efficiency” and
“quanti-quali balance”: not only in input, but also in
integral output, both short-term and long-term.
E-Val from MRC in UK is an attempt to monitor a
range of outcomes from MRC-funded research each
year, including academic publication, collaboration,
destination of researchers, public engagement and
influence on public policy. Results show where
strategies are not working, and where
successful initiatives need to be further funded.
Different research fields may need different indicators.
www.esf.org
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23. CONCLUSIONS
There are great opportunities for multilateral
research collaborations for all SEE countries, both
between themselves and with the rest of Europe and
the world.
EC FP7: Associated countries: Turkey, Croatia, FMR,
Serbia, Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia & Herzegovina.
Moldova is also an Internat Coop Partner Country.
ESF instruments: EU and non-EU countries are
welcome to participate.
www.esf.org
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24. Thank you for your attention
www.esf.org
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