www.checkbiotech.org ; www.raupp.info ; www.czu.cz

Europe's leaders are warned that the continent's way of ute is under threat
because of a failure to invest in research and development and that action
to tackle the problem is needed "before it is too late", January 2006 by
Clive Cookson and George Parker.

A report for the European Commission calls for European Union leaders to
agree a "pact for research and innovation", creating a new framework tor R&D
spending, especially in areas such as pharmaceuticals, transport and the
environment.

The report's authors - among them Esko Aho, the former Finnish prime
minister - say "large-scale action" is needed to turn Europe's usually empty
commitments to raise research spending into action. European Union R&D
represented 1.93 per cent of EU gross domestic product in 2003, compared
with 2.59 per cent in the US and 3.15 per cent in Japan.

The Aho paper is likely to form part of the Commission's report on research
policy to be presented to an EU economic summit in Brussels in March. lt
urges the EU to play a more active role in using its standard-setting
powers, as with its success in helping create the conditions for Europe's
mobile telecommunications revolution in the 1990s, The report calls for more
public support tor cutting-edge research, including a trebling of the amount
of EU structural funds spent in the area.

The paper urges greater private-sector involvement in universities and says
Europe should find ways to increase the flow of scientists between academia
and the private sector.

The report is published just days after the Unesco science report 2005
provided further evidence that emerging Asian economies, led by China, are
challenging the leadership of Europe and North America in R&D.

Asia's share of research spending rose from 27.9 per cent in 1997 to 31.5
per cent in 2002, the most recent year for which reliable figures were
available. Over the same period Europe's share fell from 28.8 to 27.3 per
cent and North America's from 38.2 per cent to 37 per cent.

[news.ft.com]

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