By strongly and firmly placing competitiveness at the heart of the European political agenda, the reinvigorated Lisbon process aimed at making Europe a more attractive place to invest, by boosting the entrepreneurial initiative and creating a productive environment where innovation capacity can grow and develop.
In order to fully meet the Lisbon goals, a particular attention has been given to ensuring coherence and synergy among all actions implemented at the EC level in the field of innovation and competitiveness.
Malta has been rated among the worst performers in innovation within the European Union but it is making good progress, according to a report out recently. I must say I would have expected to see some better results, but the important thing is that we are making good progress. It is important that this progress continues, unhindered and consistent.
The European innovation Scoreboard for 2008, published in Brussels, places Malta in the category of countries that are “catching up”, the last of four categories in the scoreboard with a well below average performance. Its rate of improvement however is above average.
The EIS attempts to benchmark, on a yearly basis, the innovation performance of Member States, drawing on statistics from a variety of sources, primarily the Community Innovation Survey.
The Innobarometer complements the results of the EIS by analysing specific aspects of innovation through a survey of 3,500 randomly selected companies in the EU. In 2006, the theme of the Innobarometer was the role of clusters in facilitating innovative activity. Innovation is a key factor to determine productivity growth. Understanding the sources and patterns of innovative activity in the economy is fundamental to develop better policies. This is the main aim of INNO-Metrics.
INNO-Metrics is currently composed of two instruments, the European Innovation Scoreboard (EIS) and the Innobarometer.
The report mentioned previously underlines that Malta’s relative strengths are in the availability of finance for innovation projects and the support by the government for innovation activities.
The main shortcomings are to be found within the private sector, according to the report. Malta’s business community lags behind when it comes to innovation and investing money in research and development.
Another weakness highlighted by the report is the lack of availability of high skilled or educated people.
The EIS scoreboard places Malta alongside Greece, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Lithuania, Romania, Latvia and Bulgaria in the catching up category, with scores significantly below the EU average.
The EIS, which has been compiled since 2001 as part of the European Union’s innovation policy, provides an annual assessment of innovation performance in the EU calculate don the basis of 29 indicators covering seven dimensions of innovation, from human resources to finance and intellectual property rights.
On a general level, the report shows that although the EU is making substantial progress it is still considered to be inferior to the US and Japan although the gap is narrowing.
EU enterprise commissioner Gunter Verheugen said when presenting the 2008 report that in a time of crisis it is not the moment to take a break in research investment and innovation.
Investments are of utmost importance if Europe wants to emerge stronger from the economic crisis, and more so if it wants to address he challenges of climate change and globalisation. This is a hard time for the global, including the European economy, but we must work together and strive to innovate to emerge victorious.
The resulting flowering of fresh ideas isn’t limited to technology and the hard sciences. To be sure, countries such as Israel and Denmark are pushing the envelope in pharmaceuticals, France is overflowing with Web startups, and even tiny Estonia – with its policies promoting universal access to the Internet has cultivated a booming information economy that bred Web phone-calling phenomenon Skype. But don’t leave out Spain, whose chefs have revolutionised contemporary cuisine; Italy, which continues to pioneer apparel and furniture design; or the financial innovations of Britain and Switzerland. Malta too has achieved a great deal in terms of innovation in the recent years. This is especially true in the financial and ICT sectors. With continued investment, we are sure to see these areas continue to expand, fuelled by innovation and creativity.
This European year of innovation and creativity aims to raise awareness of the importance of creativity and innovation as the key competences for personal, social and economic development.
The EU will offer a framework for raising awareness of the issues concerned and promoting a policy debate on how to increase Europe’s creative and innovative potential. The activities will include promotional campaigns, events and initiatives at European, national, regional and local events.
David Casa is a Nationalist MEP
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www.davidcasa.eu