JERUSALEM (EJP)--- EU Science and Research Commissioner Janez Potocnik has said he was impressed with the the level of projects in Israel after his first visit to the country.

Potocnik was in Israel for the launch of the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7).

Speaking at the launch, the former Slovenian foreign minister said the EU had much to learn from Israel, where 4.7 rercent of GDP is spent on civilian research, research and development expenditure per capita is higher than in the US and most EU countries, and 12 workers in every 1,000 in the business sector are researchers.

Israel as a model

Potocnik said that visiting Israel will help him with the reforms that need to take place within the European Research Area (ERA).

“A revamped, revitalised European Research Area can give research - and researchers - the kind of importance they already enjoy in countries like Israel,” he said. “The work of the last seven years has helped build the European Research Area. Now it is time to check its health and see how we can make it stronger.”

The Commissioner did point out that many of Israel’s achievements came as a result of European funding. He noted that the EU was now the country’s second biggest source of research funding after the Israel Science Foundation. Over 500 projects under FP6, including many in the information and communication technologies (ICT) and life sciences fields, involved Israeli partners.

Israel has been a fully associated member of the EU’s research funding programmes since 1996 and both the EU and Israel have benefited from this partnership. The Commissioner was confident that FP7 would be as successful as the other programmes.

Effective partner

“I am very confident that Israel will be as active, reliable and effective a partner in the new programme as it has been in the past," Potocnik said.

As an associated country within the EU’s research framework programme, Israel participates in the programme on the same footing as EU Member States. It has done so very successfully in past programmes, particularly in areas such as information and communication technologies and life sciences.

According to a press release from the European Commission’s Delegation to Israel, “The Seventh Framework Programme will introduce several new elements that can be very interesting for Israeli researchers, such as the European Research Council providing funding for frontier research.”

While in Israel Potocnik also met with Vice Prime Minister Shimon Peres, Minister of Industry, Trade and Labour Eli Yishai and acting Minister of Science, Culture and Sport, Yael Tamir.