Innovation and Enterprise - A successful combination for the European Economic and Social Committee and the Belgian Presidency of the European Union
On 2 July 2010, as part of the Belgian Presidency of the EU, a conference entitled ‘Innovation and Enterprise - The Role of Socio-Economic Players’ took place in the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC). The event was organised by EESC in collaboration with the Cabinet of Jean-Claude Marcourt, Vice-President and Minister for Economic Affairs, SMEs, External Trade and New Technologies of the Walloon Regional Government. One of the aims of the conference was to prepare the work of the informal Council of Ministers of Industry and Research, which will be held on 14, 15 and 16 July 2010.
The Belgian Consultative Committees that operate at the federal level and also in the three regions of Wallonia, Flanders and Brussels Capital, presented their analyses of, and recommendations on, the four main topics addressed during the conference:
- European R&D and innovation programmes – responding to societal challenges;
- Making better use of R&D research results;
- The process of opening up to non-technical innovation; and
- Clusters.
In his opening speech, Mari Sepi, President of the EESC, underlined that, although statistics tended to indicate an economic recovery, for enterprises this recovery was not yet tangible. “The money is there but it doesn’t get through” he stated and added that “it is crucial to fix the flow of capital and make it available to SMEs.”
Jean-Claude Marcourt then highlighted the current importance of the social dialogue and the role that EESC could play. “Nowadays, we know innovation is not so much invention or discovery, but rather transformation of opportunities into new ideas, and exploitation of change as opportunity,” he said. This implied that aspects of innovation were non-technological and were not driven purely by an R&D perspective. In this sense, innovation contributes to the transformation of not only the European economy but also European society, particularly as it is now facing challenges such as climate change and an ageing population. The Minister, who is now leading the Competitiveness Council during the six-month Belgian Presidency, concluded by calling for an eco-efficient economy, specific tools to support innovative SMEs and the continuous development of a clustering policy in Europe.
In providing the point of view of the European Social Partners, Henri Malosse, the EESC Rapporteur for Innovation Policy, welcomed the views expressed by Jean-Claude Marcourt. He stressed the need for innovation to be considered in broader terms than simply those of technological improvement and highlighted the role of SMEs in creating and spreading innovation. He also indicated the need to integrate innovation as a horizontal component within all aspects of policy-making
The four topics of the conference that are outlined above were addressed in dedicated sessions and the following ideas were the most important to emerge from these discussions:
- The need for a European patent system;
- The need to decompartmentalise the work of universities and enterprises;
- The key role of clusters and, in particular, the added value that lies in inter-clustering;
- The need for the development of an innovation culture – including both entrepreneurship and risk management; and finally
- The importance of evaluating previous and on-going policies in order to improve the design of future policies.
