India, EU decides to renew agreement on science, tech cooperation for 5 years

New Delhi, July 17: In a major development, India & the European Union agreed to renew the Agreement on scientific cooperation for the next five years, 2020-2025, at the 15th India-EU Summit.

 

 

The India-EU Agreement on Science and Technology concluded in 2001 and expired on May 17. With an agreement to renew it, both India and the EU agreed to collaborate further in research and innovation based on the principles of mutual benefit and reciprocity. "Both parties are committed to launch the renewal procedure in time and acknowledge 20 years of robust cooperation on research and innovation," the joint statement said.

 

This will help to enhance research and innovation cooperation in different fields like Water, Energy, Healthcare, Agritech & Bioeconomy, Integrated Cyber-Physical Systems, Information and Communication Technologies, Nanotechnology, and clean technologies, etc. It will also strengthen the institutional linkages in research, exchange of researchers, students, startups and attract co-investment of resources for co-generation of knowledge.

 

Earlier, Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan, chaired a meeting via video conferencing to review India - EU S&T agreement with all Indian stakeholders – Department of Science & Technology (DST), Department of Biotechnology (DBT), Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) & CSIR.

 

The review meeting suggested the renewal of the agreement on S&T co-operation between the countries because in the last 5 years, 73 joint research projects have been implemented. This resulting in around 200 joint research publications & filing of few patents.

 

There have also been 500 exchange visits of researchers & students in this period. The 5 years have seen joint activities in knowledge generation, human capacity development, technology development, technology deployment in Water, Health, Material (including Nanosciences) & Bioeconomy.

 

Earlier, in the day PM Narendra Modi co-chaired the virtual summit with European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.