Maltese representatives recently visited the EU’s Joint Research Centre’s Ispra site in the north of Italy, led by the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST).

Those attending included representatives from a number of public entities such as the Malta Environment and Planning Authority (Mepa), the Water Services Corporation, Enemalta, the Malta Standards Authority, the University of Malta and EuroMedITI.

The Joint Research Centre (JRC) is the scientific arm of the European Commission. It undertakes scientific research in its seven institutes across Europe in support of the development, implementation and monitoring of policies that have a scientific and technological component.

The two-day visit included meetings with JRC researchers in the laboratories of the Institutes for Environment and Sustainability, Protection and Security of the Citizen and Health and Consumer Protection. It was a follow-up to a round-table meeting that was organised jointly by the MCST and the JRC in Malta last October.

The MCST said collaboration between the JRC and the Maltese scientific community was growing steadily and today Malta was a partner in a number of networks and projects dealing with topics such as air and soil quality, GMOs, standards and labelling and waste management. The MCST, as the national contact organisation for the JRC, strives to encourage enhanced collaboration with the JRC through facilitating participation of Maltese researchers and technical staff in specialised workshops and conferences organised throughout the year within the JRC institutes.

One of the roles of the JRC is that of assisting new member states with the transposition of EU Directives. Opportunities for short-term exchanges of scientific and technical staff involved in the implementation of such Directives including the new Chemicals Policy REACH and the INSPIRE Directive on establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information were also explored.

JRC website: http://www.jrc.ec.europa.eu; MCST website: http://www.mcst.org.mt