Abstract The study aims to offer some insight into the performance patterns of Member States in the Framework Programme (FP) using advanced statistics. It also evaluates some key factors which affect participation rate in FP.
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Member States can be grouped into four clusters. FR, DE, IT, ES, UK have the highest average on financial contributions per project as well as percentage of coordinators in FP7, but have the lowest number of projects per GDP and per capita. On the contrary, CY, EE, MT, SI have the highest number of projects per GDP and per capita, but the lowest average on financial contributions per project. They have also the highest financial contribution per GDP. AT, BE, DK, FI, GR, IE, NL, SE are performing well in all indicators, while BG, CZ, HU, LV, LT, LU, PL, PT, RO, SK have low averages on all performance indicators used in the study. Comparison of performance in FP6 to FP7 reveals that in FP7, the differences between the countries in the latter, least successful cluster and the other clusters of countries have generally intensified. ... It is evident that the year of accession to EU (“learning effect”) has no effect on FP indicators. However, the RD expenditure, which highly correlates with RD&I excellence, as well as the population in member state account for 92% of the variability between Member States in their financial contributions per retained project.
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A number of policy recommendations can be drawn based on the results. ...
Firstly, performance of member states in FP is strongly related to the investment in RD in a country. In order to improve their participation, the countries therefore need to invest more.
Secondly, population of a county matters. In case of big countries this is likely due to the existence of internal networks of actors, which collaborate on national scale, and continue with the partnerships on EU scale. ... Of course, little can be done to increase the size of population of a country in order to offer more possibilities for networking on a national level, but it can virtually grow in size by opening its programmes to collaborations across borders and thus contribute to stronger integration of its research community in ERA.
Lastly, measures can be established in Member states, which will stimulate researchers to take leading roles in projects. With this, their visibility, impact as well as financial participation is likely to increase.
Oznake: S.D.