EU-India relations and cooperation in research have substantially progressed in the last decade with the signing of the Science and Technology (S&T) Cooperation Agreement backed by regular revision & updating of Joint S&T priorities. India has become a valuable partner with the EU in major international projects such as the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor or ITER (www.iter.org) project, GALILEO (http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/energy_transport/galileo/index_en.htm), the European Satellite Navigation system and the interlinking of India’s Education Research Network, ERNET, to its pan European equivalent GEANT2.
The importance of EU-India co-operation in S&T has been highlighted at the highest political level. The "New Delhi Communiqué", issued at the end of the Ministerial Conference in 2007 and co-signed by the Conference Co-chairs, underlined the importance of a strong science and knowledge base as a major prerequisite for competitiveness and underlined the strong role of international S&T collaboration. The Ministers and their representatives recognized that, at this time, important “windows of opportunity” existed for a significant increase in the breadth and depth of EU-India S&T co-operation, especially through the EU’s 7th Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development 2007-2013 and India’s 11th Five Year Plan.
The solid partnership between the EU and India, their great traditions in science and technology as well as the recent political impetus provided by the EU-India Ministerial Science Conference, are now being translated into ambitious, high quality and mutually beneficial co-operative programmes, projects and dialogues.
India is also showing a growing degree of openness in the identification of mechanisms to support the co-funding of joint or coordinated calls for proposals with the European Union (EU). The report of the Steering Committee on Science and Technology, established by the Planning Commission of India for the 11th Five Year Plan covering years 2007-2012, stresses the importance of International collaboration initiatives in terms of R&D projects and also partnering in International projects. The Department of Science and Technology has proposed an outlay of approx € 70 million for International cooperation for the 11th Five Year Plan.
In fact, India is one of the few countries that have coordinated calls with the EU. The launch of the first ever EU-India Coordinated Call for Proposals on Computational Materials Science was a major milestone. Both sides have committed €5 million each to this Call.
Source: www.delind.ec.europe.eu
Background documents and links
Specifically in the ICT sector, one of the “courses of action” in the 11th Five Year Plan of Government of India, is to ‘pursue international cooperation and partnerships in ICT for development’, to address emerging needs in economic and social domains, and also in building infrastructure and competencies for R&D.
EU-India Cooperation in ICT in particular, was significantly reinforced in 2001 when India and the EU took concrete steps to promote mutual cooperation in the development of ICT and a modern information society, as expressed in the Joint EU-India Vision Statement on IT adopted at the Second Summit in New Delhi in 2001.
During the India-EU Summit held at Lisbon in June 2000, it was agreed that an Indo-EU Working Group (WG) on Information Society would be set up for promoting bilateral cooperation in all areas of ICT. The first meeting of the India-EU Working Group on Information Society was held in January 2001 in New Delhi
Areas of Common Interest - The EU and India have agreed to
- Enhance EU-India co-operation in the Seventh Framework Programme
- Exchange views on a regular basis on - e-commerce, internet governance, universal service
- Encourage India-EU joint research proposals and collaborative activities in 4G, e-government, e-education and e-health
- Exchange views on telecommunication spectrum management and on roaming and interoperability of telecommunication services
- Work towards GEANT-ERNET connectivity.
JWG meeting - A Joint Working Group (JWG) on ICT was established under an institutional agreement between the European Union and the Government of India’s Department of Information Technology. It meets annually and discusses agreed agendas and programmes for mutual cooperation, especially in the area of ICT research. The JWG considers the joint action plan and implementation reports of the preceding year and subsequently arrives at new or modified policy and regulatory frameworks for the subsequent year.
The JWG meetings are inter-governmental, closed-door meetings which follow a top-down approach. The JWG mainly comprises policy-makers from both regions and very few researchers and stakeholders.
The sixth JWG meeting was held in March 2009 at Brussels where Indian side expressed the desire to proactively participate in development of the technology for mutual benefits in which resources can be pooled together. Some of the possible areas for strategic cooperation are standards for e-Governance, e-Security, knowledge network, biometrics, telecom like energy efficiency & alternate energy source and automated spectrum monitoring, open technologies/open source and institutional structure and mechanism.
(Source: DIT)
Related documents and links
Synchroniser is not the only initiative with the objective to enhance the EU-India International Cooperation. There are several other EU-India Support Action initiatives, funded under different programmes of the European Commission’s FP7 which are striving to increase the research collaboration between EU and India. While Synchroniser and EuroIndia – SPIRIT are ICT focused, projects like INDIA GATE, EUINEC, NEW INDIGO are S&T focused initiatives.
Synchroniser project has already established synergies with the EuroIndia SPIRIT project in order to maximize the outputs of the projects in terms of sharing information, disseminating project outcomes, organizing joint events and participation in each others events whenever feasible. A similar activities’ synchronization is being pursued with other EU-India S&T projects as well as EU-ASEAN project called SEACOOP in order to understand and share experiences and best practices between the regions.
EuroIndia SPIRIT
Euro-India SPIRIT aims to engage the EU and Indian ICT stakeholders at a level where policy formulation pertaining to research can be aligned and supported to identify the priorities of key research stakeholders and constituencies. The outcome is to formulate a mutually-beneficial research and innovation agenda that can be taken up through specific bilateral initiatives. More...
India Gate
The main objective of the INDIA GATE project is to increase the S&T cooperation between India and the EU by creating a “one-stop shop” for funding opportunities that are available in India for European organizations. The INDIA GATE project will identify Indian research and innovation funding programmes, the obstacles that inhibit EU researchers and organizations from taking part in the identified opportunities and make the information available in a user-friendly manner to stimulate, encourage and facilitate participation. INDIA GATE project starts with a review of the available funding opportunities and an analysis of the obstacles facing European organisations willing to participate in Indian funded projects. More...
EUINEC
EUINEC aims to improve the flow of information on programmes and funding opportunities designed to support scientific and technological cooperation between the EU and India as well as identify and demonstrate mutual understanding, interest and benefit in S&T cooperation between the EU and India.
The overall objective of EUINEC is to improve the S&T cooperation between Europe and India by establishing the EU-India research cooperative, the EUINEC Co-op, that will allow for the exchange of information and partner search, serve as the base for the practical and user-orientated training and be the frame for policy development and the identification of areas of cooperation. More...
NEW INDIGO
New INDIGO presents itself as an initiative for the development and the integration of Indian and European research, thus building an extended web of partnership to ultimately launch European programmes with India. More...
EU-ASEAN initiative: SEACOOP
The SEACOOP project aims at supporting the development of Infor¬mation Society policy dialogues and the strengthening of coopera¬tion on ICT research with the ASEAN region in general and with Sin¬gapore in particular (since a MoU on ICT has been signed). More...
