FP7 Specific International Scientific Cooperation Activities (INCO)

Website: cordis.europa.eu/inco/home_en.html




To find similar Items, click on a keyword below:
Background Information



International Cooperation in FP7

The Commission's proposals for the FP7 Capacities programme aim to enhance research and innovation capacities throughout Europe and ensure their optimal use. The Capacities programme is provided with a budget of EUR 4 097 million to operate in veral broad areas that includes International cooperation, through a continuation of the INCO programme.

To become more competitive and play a leading role globally, the European Community needs a strong and coherent international science and technology (S&T) policy with three objectives:

• European competitiveness through strategic partnerships with non-EU countries in selected fields of science and by engaging the best scientists from such countries to work with and in Europe;
• enhance the production of knowledge and scientific excellence by enabling European universities, research institutions and firms to establish contacts with their partners in such third countries, thereby facilitating access to research environments outside Europe and promoting synergies on a global scale;
• address specific problems that third countries face, or that have a global character, on the basis of mutual interest and mutual benefit.

Bi-regional coordination of S&T cooperation including priority setting and definition of S&T cooperation policies; bringing together policy makers, scientific community, civil society and private sector stakeholders from the EU and third countries to identify priorities and define policy orientations; implementing specific activities dedicated to strengthening participation from targeted countries and regions in FP7, including support for information points in the third countries:

• Western Balkan area
• Mediterranean area
• EECA countries
• Latin America
• ACP and South Africa
• Asia

This is a continuation of the previous FP6 activity

The general objective of international cooperation activities carried out under the sixth Framework Programme (FP6) was to help open up the European Research Area to the world. These activities focus on the mutually beneficial efforts of the Community and its Member States on the one hand and INCO target countries and other third countries on the other. The major areas of assistance are: third country participation in the various thematic programmes, funding researchers' mobility (Marie Curie actions), and a dedicated programme for international scientific cooperation (INCO).

The activities under INCO lent support, in the scientific and technological fields, to the implementation of the Community's foreign policy and development aid policy and to strengthen, develop and consolidate our Partner countries' research systems as a means of reinforcing synergies with these external policies.