DIISRTE Brussels Alert: EU announces final and biggest ever set of FP-7 calls

Posted July 13, 2012 - 09:57

The European Commission announced the 2013 Work Programme of the EU Seventh Framework Programme for Research (FP7). The last set of calls for proposals under FP7 will provide €8.1 billion for projects and ideas that will boost Europe's competitiveness and address key issues such as human health, environmental protection and challenges resulting from growing urbanisation and waste management.

All areas of the 2013 Work Programme are generally open to Australian research institutions. In most cases, however, Australian institutions have to bring their own funding unless their participation is deemed essential for the project.

There are targeted cooperation opportunities, explicitly encouraging Australian participation, or referring to Australia, in the following areas (call reference in bold):

Health: Diabetes/Obesity and Chronic Diseases - FP7-HEALTH.2013.4.1-5 andCoordination and Support Action on Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases(no call code)
Knowledge-based Bioeconomy: Fisheries and Food & Health -KBBE.2013.1.2-08 and KBBE.2013.2.2-02
Energy: two topics on Carbon Capture and Storage - ENERGY.2013.5.1-2 andENERGY.2013.6.1.1
Information and Communication Technology: Trustworthy ICT and International Partnership Building - ICT-2013.1.5 Trustworthy ICT and ICT-2013.10.3
Transport: High-Speed Civil Air Transport - AAT.2013.8-2
Social Science and Humanities: Multilingual Policies - SSH.2013.5.2-1
International Cooperation: Bi-regional coordination of S&T cooperation in the Pacific region - FP7-INCO-2013-1 (INCO-NET)

The calls target both innovation and a range of societal challenges building a bridge to Horizon 2020, the next EU funding programme for research and innovation from 2014-2020. The calls cover the following areas:

€4.8 billion will go to thematic research priorities (Cooperation);
€2.7 billion will be used to strengthen networking and boost the quality of researchers in Europe (People) through:
Marie Curie actions for research training and mobility (€963 million);
European Research Council individual grants for fundamental research based on excellence (€1.75 billion);
€574 million will be provided under the Capacities Programme (which includes research infrastructures, SMEs, regional activities, international cooperation, science in society, etc.).

Industrial innovation will be supported in all of these areas through close-to-market activities such as piloting, demonstration, standardisation and technology transfer. Special attention will be given to Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) in a package worth up to €1.2 billion.

New, innovative and mostly cross-thematic research priorities in this FP7 call include:

around €155 million for "Oceans of the future", to support sustainable growth in the marine and maritime sectors;
around €365 million for technologies that will transform urban areas into sustainable "Smart Cities and Communities";
some €147 million to combat the rise of drug-resistant bacteria; and
nearly €100 million dedicated to innovative solutions for managing fresh water resources.

Launched in 2007, FP7 has a total budget of €55 billion and to date has financed more than 19,000 projects involving more than 79,000 participants. It will be followed, in early 2014, by the Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme which combines a number of EU programmes under one banner. The Commission proposes to invest €80 billion in Horizon 2020.

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For general information:

European Commission's FP7 Website - contains all relevant links

Press Release

Memo

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For information on the respective thematic Work Programmes and specific opportunities for cooperation:

All Work Programmes can be directly accessed via below links. They are in PDP format and can be easily searched by entering 'Australia' in the 'Find' function.

Cooperation

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - General Introduction

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Health

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Food, Agriculture and Fisheries, and Biotechnology (KBBE)

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Information and Communications Technologies (ICT)

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Nanosciences, Nanotechnologies, Materials and New Production Technologies (NMP)

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Energy

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Environment (including Climate Change)

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Transport (including Aeronautics)

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Socio-Economic Sciences and Humanities

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Space

2013 Cooperation Work Programme - Security