Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on the 'Communication from the Commission to the Council, the European Parliament, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions "Reinforcing cohesion and competitiveness through research, technological development and innovation"'
C 40/12 EN Official Journal of the European Communities 15. 2. 1999 Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on the ‘Communication from the Commission to the Council, the European Parliament, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions “Reinforcing cohesion and competitiveness through research, technological development and innovation”’ (1999/C 40/06) On 8 June 1998 the Commission decided to consult the Economic and Social Committee, under Article 198 of the Treaty establishing the European Community, on the above-mentioned communication. The Section for Economic and Monetary Union and Economic and Social Cohesion, which was responsible for preparing the Committee’s work on the subject, adopted its opinion on 20 October 1998. The rapporteur was Mr Bernabei. At its 359th plenary session (meeting of 2 December 1998), the Economic and Social Committee adopted the following opinion unanimously. 1. Introduction based on the interactive evolution of economic, scientific, technological and innovative variables (2): 1. 1. As emphasized in the 1997 Second European Report on Science and Technology Indicators, statistics bear out the existence of a technological gap between the 15 Member States more than twice as large as the economic, or ‘cohesion gap’. While the technological gap measured in terms of the GDP/RTD spending ratio between the richest and poorest Member States stands at about 5:1, the ‘cohesion gap’ is less than 2:1. — firstly, the ‘sleeping birds’, which are primarily agricultural, with high unemployment and little technological activity, encompassing almost all of Greece except for Attica, three Portuguese regions (Centro, Alentejo, Algarve) and one Italian region, Calabria; these are all Objective 1 regions. Their involvement in the Community’s Third Framework RTDD Programme has been under 2,2 %; The ‘technology scorecards’ can be used to assess 1. 2. the various technology systems of the Member States: some have high levels of spending such as France and Germany, whose RTD spending accounts for some 2,3 % of GDP. This compares with approximately 1 % for Italy, while the four cohesion countries generally have less structured RTD systems, with the exception of Ireland — on account of the presence of large multinationals — and lastly, the smaller countries which display a sustained level of expenditure, particularly on the part of the private sector, resulting from the presence of a small number of large multinational companies. The numbers employed in the high-tech sectors 1. 3. has been estimated to stand at more than 10,6 million for the EU as a whole, representing 7,2 % of the working population. The highest percentage is in Germany (more than 10 %), the lowest in Greece (less than 2 %). Of the ten leading regions in terms of high-tech employment, six are German, two Italian, one French and one British (1). 1. 4. Four ‘clusters’ of regions have been identified by applying a systems-oriented approach to innovation (1) Cf. Eurostat Memo 5/98 of 24 April 1998. — secondly, the ‘question mark’ or ‘wildcat’ regions, with rural economies, a good level of economic growth and some technological activity but very high unemployment, including eight Spanish regions, eight French regions, Ireland, ten Italian regions and 2 Portuguese regions; half of these regions come under Objective 1. Their involvement is less than 12 %; — thirdly, the ‘cash cows of Europe’, with medium to high levels of technological activity and average unemployment rates, comprising most of the remain- ing European regions with the exception of five German regions, the Ile de France and Rhône-Alpes, and the Dutch Noord-Brabant; about 40 % of these regions are leaders in terms of technological intensity. This group of regions constitutes Europe’s industrial heartland, and participation in the Third Framework Programme has exceeded 50 %; — the fourth cluster comprises a small group leading the field in terms of rapid-growth technological intensity and low unemployment: these are the ‘stars of Europe’, represented by Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Hesse, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Rheinland- the Ile de France, Rhône-Alpes and the Pfalz, Noord-Brabant. These regions absorb more than (2) See Commission Second European Report on S&T indi- cators 1997, part III — European diversity, convergence and cohesion. 15. 2. 1999 EN Official Journal of the European Communities C 40/13 22 % of the Community’s Framework Programme resources. The average number of patents they lodged is five times higher than the European average. to all tiers of public authorities. Lastly, there must be effective benchmarking — including from the financial point of view — of existing services and networks, information, support, training and upskilling, and effec- tive arrangements for protecting intellectual property. The three new Member States are not included: their regions would appear to fit into the third and fourth categories. This systems-oriented approach has also revealed 1. 5. ten ‘leading innovation islands’ highly-specialized in a technological hard-core sector and possessing a broadly spread fabric of SMEs that are not only high-tech but also ‘the vanguard of technology’, [terminology used by the Committee in its own-initiative opinions on the impact on SMEs of the steady, widespread reduction in RTD funds (at Community and national level) (1), and ways and means of strengthening the networks for the provision of information on and exploitation of applied RTD programmes in Europe (2)]. ‘Innovation islands’ of this kind have been identified in the South East of England, Paris, Frankfurt, Munich, Turin, Rotterdam/ Amsterdam, Stuttgart, Lyon/Grenoble and Milan. 1. 6. It may be readily understood from the above analysis that involvement in Community RTD actions by the less developed regions has been clearly marginal, in clear contrast with the provisions of Title XIV of the Treaty concerning the priorities for strengthening economic and social cohesion in all Community actions, in terms of both closing the development gap between the various regions and of catch-up by disadvantaged regions. Given that market globalization implies compe- tition between systems, it is clear that the shortcomings and imbalances of the European system, as compared to the other two trade blocs, are a grave threat to EU competitiveness on the world market. This means that the analysis and treatment 1. 7. cannot be restricted to the cohesion countries alone, since they would then be partial and unable to address the European innovation paradox, enhance European competitiveness and initiate clear and appropriate stra- tegies at Community, national, interregional, regional and local level. The approach must be based on identification of the need for efficient and systematic industrial and technological assessments, accessible to all the economic and social actors of technological and industrial develop- should also be available ment. Such assessments (1) OJ C 355, 21. 11. 1997. (2) OJ C 284, 14. 9. 1998. 1. 8. The Committee has developed its own thinking in this area in a series of opinions ranging from those mentioned above on SMEs and technological research and innovation, and those on the Green Paper on innovation (3) and the Communication on the implemen- tation of the First Action Plan for Innovation in Europe (4), to the opinions adopted on utility models and patents (5), on the Community’s Fifth Framework Programme for RTD and demonstration activities 1998- 2002 (6), and on the specific programmes (7). 1. 9. The Committee has already had occasion to address the problems connected with the cohesion aspect of the information society (1) and the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP)(7), i. e. on the Member States’ long-term approaches to spatial planning. Lastly, the Committee has frequently discussed issues arising from the impact of the introduction of new technologies on employment (8), the development of the capital market for SMEs (9), and fostering entrepreneurship (10). 2. The Commission proposal 2. 1. The Communication from the Commission sets out to provide a single, coherent framework for the wide range of actions and measures which are aimed at bringing together cohesion, competitiveness, research and technological development and innovation in order to integrate them into the productive fabric of the regions, and particularly the less-developed ones, in the interests of the harmonious development of the European Union. 2. 2. More specifically, the Commission aims to reinforce the competitive capacity of less favoured regions (LFR) and geographical areas eligible for support (3) OJ C 22, 22. 7. 1996. (4) OJ C 235, 27. 7. 1998. (5) OJ C 129, 27. 4. 1998. (6) OJ C 355, 21. 11. 1997 and C 73, 9. 3. 1998. (7) OJ C 407, 28. 12. 1998. (8) OJ C 66, 3. 3. 1997. (9) Committee opinion on European capital markets for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises: prospects and potential obstacles to progress, OJ C 235, 27. 7. 1998. (10) Committee opinion on fostering entrepreneurship in Europe: priorities for the future, OJ C 235, 27. 7. 1998. C 40/14 EN Official Journal of the European Communities 15. 2. 1999 from the Structural Funds, by ensuring that Fund- supported research and innovation — whether falling under Objectives 1, 2 or 4 or ERDF Article 10 or ESF Article 6 — are closely coordinated with the schemes of multi-year Community programmes which are aimed at SMEs and innovation, or at the training and mobility of researchers. 2. 3. Close coordination of this kind must, in the Commission’s view, involve the strategies and roles of the various local, regional, Member State and Community levels, in order to: — strengthen the willingness of the regions to integrate research and innovation into their economic develop- ment; — enhance learning processes in order to make busi- nesses more innovative; — assist businesses and institutions to break down obstacles and adjust to new forms of work organ- ization; — coordinate national-level sectoral policies in such a way as to support regional development more closely. To this end, the Commission identifies three 2. 4. priorities for these strategies: — promoting innovation by means of: • demand-side schemes with greater involvement of economic players and SMEs; a total quality management policy at regional and local level; new financing and management mechanisms; better and more focused business support services; promotion of professional mobility, cooperation between research institutes and SMEs; venture capital support for new firms; intellectual property rights policies; mechanisms to promote company- related RTD, so as to boost the number of SMEs undertaking research; promoting best practice in commercial and financial start-up and marketing for industrial applications and in research results network services; — improving networking and industrial cooperation: various organizational and spatial conditions for customized and differentiated approaches to tech- nology support; — strengthening human capabilities: • greater Social Funds efforts to increase investment in human capital and life-long learning in less favoured regions; ESF action under Objective 4 to improve qualifications and management capability adapted to industrial change and changes in production systems; promotion of information technologies for open and distance learning sys- tems, and support for tele-working. 2. 5. The Commission plans, on the basis of the raft of measures outlined above, to establish guidelines for structural intervention in the sphere of RDT and innovation; ex-ante evaluation of regional development plans; consolidation of a demand-led, bottom-up approach; joint development with the Member States of a set of indicators for RTD and innovation from the structural policy standpoint; strengthening of trans- national partnership between centres of excellence in LFRs and those in the other regions; encouraging candidate countries to develop appropriate strategies at national and regional level to stimulate exchange of experience with the Member States; and creating an RTD and innovation European interactive web site. 3. General comments 3. 1. The Committee welcomes the Communication’s presentation concerning the links between Community structural policies and the Union’s research and inno- vation policies, as the Committee has urged on several occasions. The ESC also believes that close coordination of these policies is essential in order to achieve optimum levels of practical synergy and to enable the needs of citizens, businesses and society to be fully met with the overall objective of sustainable, smooth medium- to long-term growth, in keeping with the integrated RTD problem-solving approach and with the key development factor of intangible investment. • development of ‘technological monitoring’ ser- vices and their diffusion through networking; identifying gaps between supply infrastructure and SMEs; facilitating business networks; creating clusters of subcontracting firms; developing tech- nology validation and transfer projects; investigat- ing the social aspects of innovation; analysis of the 3. 2. The pace of technology in Europe differs from that of its competitor countries, being far slower, less pervasive and less a part of daily life. In Europe, scientific excellence has not been accompanied by a capacity to translate it into industrial and commercial success at market level. This is because Europe has devoted fewer 15. 2. 1999 EN Official Journal of the European Communities C 40/15 resources to technological intangible investment than the other trading blocs and also because the inflexibility of the surrounding environment has favoured financial in production rationalization over job- investment creating investment, as it was held to be safer, easier to control and hence more profitable. 3. 3. One asset which is lacking is an innovation and enterprise culture — that is to say the strategic resource will shape the European regions’ global competitiveness. If the innovation paradox is a consequence of the above-mentioned factors, and in particular of a culture which, until recently, favoured the pre-competitive nature of Community RTDD — far-removed from the market, out of sight and difficult to understand; difficult also to integrate with Community action under the structural policy and incapable of translating the poten- tial requirements of end-users and consumers into real demand. The new course of the multiannual action pro- 3. 4. gramme under the Community RTDD policy, which is now geared towards problem solving for citizens, business and society, coincides with the launching of an in-depth debate on the reform of the Structural Funds within the framework of Agenda 2000. In the Com- mittee’s view, it is vital to take advantage of this unique opportunity presented by the simultaneous redefinition of the two key instruments, in order to take a fully integrated approach to intangible investment. 3. 4. 1. From the standpoint of Community RTDD policy, the new ‘problem-solving’ integrated key actions should be accompanied by ‘new ways of managing the wide variety of disciplines and sectors; applied, generic and basic research, as well as demonstration activities, must also be all-encompassing in terms of clustering and simultaneous engineering, and companies, particularly SMEs, and end-users must work together to standardize, innovate, exploit and divulge, as well as to train. All this must be integrated by European and international cooperation — particularly Eureka — for each key action’. 3. 4. 2. With regard to structural cohesion policy, technological development and innovation can only be fostered by combined, simultaneous and straightforward action on structures, infrastructure, training, spatial planning, boosting demand, business services, computer networks, venture capital back-up and protection of intellectual property. This would, on the one hand, enhance technological development in terms of employ- ment and social cohesion and, on the other, bring about full integration into the local/regional economic and productive fabric, in a spirit of European competi- tiveness. In this connection, the Committee deems it 3. 5. necessary to: — formulate and adopt an overall Community strategy for streamlining the relevant mechanisms of Euro- pean policies, in order — while respecting regional identities — to allow Europe to speak with one voice from the point of view of competitiveness and the sustainable and harmonious development of the European system; — identify integrated instruments with which to decom- partmentalize local, regional and national inno- vation markets, which are all the more anachronistic in view of EMU and the countdown to the single European currency that will represent the completion of the European single market; — establish the levels of integration and their interac- tion, inter alia in order to synchronize and ensure the decision-making and the compatibility of implementation aspects of the structural cohesion policy and RTD/innovation policy. This is vital in order that the policies be fully and effectively integrated; — identify new ways to combine the cohesion and RTDD instruments, using simplified methods and procedures which are, wherever possible, uniform and automatic. Full advantage should be taken of the possibility allowed by the WTO agreements (whereby up to 75 % of a project’s costs may be subsidized) to vary the levels of support for company RTD; — set up systems to control and monitor combined RTDD/cohesion schemes in order to assess their effectiveness in terms of the achievement of the declared objectives; this could be done by using preestablished and harmonized performance indi- cators, as well as benchmarking at regional level. 4. Towards an overall Community strategy of stream- lining and integration 4. 1. Market globalization has led to direct compe- tition between socio-economic systems, legal systems, abilities to put human resources to best use and to incorporate new technologies into products and processes that are updated at an increasingly rapid pace. Competition is increasingly between systems rather than between individual companies. An overall Community, system-based strategy is therefore needed in order to respond to such challenges, designed to ensure development which is sustainable in the medium term. 4. 2. In the Committee’s view, this strategy should include mechanisms for combined action at regional level, in accordance with the main features and needs of C 40/16 EN Official Journal of the European Communities 15. 2. 1999 the regions. A streamlined range of integrated actions should also be developed, at national, regional and local level, so that LFRs can interact with the regions where the growth of technology is more rapid. The actions should also concentrate on those SMEs whose potential for innovation is as yet untapped — the ‘vanguard’ of the research programmes. 4. 3. The elaboration of such an integrated and coordinated strategy must be a matter, first and fore- most, for the Commission management and for that of its services. In this regard, the Committee fails to understand why no mention is made of the experience of the Task Forces under the Fourth Community RTDD Framework Programme. The Task Forces could have involved in highlighted the numerous difficulties operating structural intervention frameworks jointly with targeted research based on employment, the pros- pects for growth, the opportunities for broadening the industrial base, sustainable development, European added value and, in particular, economic and social cohesion in terms of the presence of interested SMEs spread throughout the EU, the promising outlook for disseminating scientific, technical and training capacities through quality networks, and the effects on remote and outlying regions (1). It is on these grounds that the Committee 4. 4. considers it essential to draw up such an overall strategy for streamlining and integrating existing mechanisms of the various European policies concerned: structural policies, policies for research and innovation, education and training, business and business culture, spatial planning and enlargement. 5. Identifying integrated instruments 5. 1. The Committee deems it essential to fully inte- grate cohesion and RTDD instruments in order to enhance their effect in terms of new jobs, new businesses, new professions and a new competitiveness for Europe. The innovation market, which is currently split 5. 2. into 15 national systems and even more regional sub- systems, must be rapidly decompartmentalized by means of various instruments. As it stands, in view of the single European currency and the single market, the present innovation market is purely anachronistic. 5. 3. One such instrument could be that of back- up/information/exploitation networks. These should incorporate a broader mechanism to support ‘mediation’ in accordance with user needs, as well as mechanisms for monitoring technological developments. They should also be linked on an interregional and European level, as recommended in the Committee opinion on ‘Ways and means of strengthening the networks for the provision of information on and exploitation of applied RTD programmes in Europe’ (2). 5. 4. Furthermore, trend charts should be created in order to systematically compare research and technologi- cal innovation measures at regional, national and Community level so that researchers and end-users can jointly consolidate and avail themselves of the instruments for action at various levels, as highlighted by the Committee in its opinion on the proposals for decision regarding the Fifth Community Framework Programme on RTDD (1998-2002) (3). 5. 5. The Committee strongly emphasizes the need to make the support of technology/innovation develop- ment one of the top priorities among those established by the Commission in the Structural Funds Support Frameworks. This support should also be given priority under the Cohesion Fund and the instrument for structural policies for pre-accession (ISPA), and be granted the same status and resources as the other priority actions. One of the main criteria for acceptance of national and regional plans by the Commission should be compliance with the above. 5. 6. With a view to synergy between training and RTDD, the Committee believes it is important to integrate Community training programmes, such as Leonardo and Socrates, not to mention Structural Fund action under the new Objective 3. This is an essential component of that intangible investment that is the development of human and technological potential and would help to prevent exclusion and strengthen the social dimension of cohesion. 5. 6. 1. The actions currently covered by Objective 4 must, however, be fully incorporated in Objective 3 in order to accommodate the new technologies; the action should include continuous training in management of complex problems, as called for in the opinion on reform of the Structural Funds adopted on 10 September 1988 (4). 5. 6. 2. Lastly, we need to create a ‘virtuous circle’ drawing in projects which acknowledge the human dimension, the involvement of people as key actors in (1) Cf. Unité Operationnelle Recherche-Industrie; Aperçu des travaux, Commission DGXII 1997. (2) OJ C 284, 14. 9. 1998. (3) OJ C 355, 21. 11. 1997. (4) OJ C 407, 28. 12. 1998. 15. 2. 1999 EN Official Journal of the European Communities C 40/17 development, and are based on a model for economic and social development fostering a positive view of new technological applications and the challenge of world competition, through conscious participation by the labour force in the development process. 6. Defining the integrated levels of action 6. 1. In the Committee’s view, the very notion of ‘problem-solving’ key actions in RTD, which imply new simultaneous engineering capacities of various types of action (technological, demonstrative, innovative, dissemination, educational, financial, etc. ) — the aim being to boost employment and production at regional level — is likely to foster broad synergies with the instruments for cohesion at the various levels of inte- grated action. 6. 2. The inclusion of ex ante impact assessments in the individual work programmes of the key actions, as advocated by the Committee (1), will facilitate the combined use of the relevant EU policy instruments. This will, in turn, create more powerful synergies and enhance the positive effects of such policies. 6. 2. 1. In the Committee’s view, all Community instru- ments relevant to project aims — regardless of the Community’s policy approach, or of the directorate- general or Commission service responsible for the instruments — should be succinctly but explicitly included in implementing programmes of the Fifth Framework Programme. The aim is to ensure trans- parence and coherence. 6. 3. The innovation units that are to be set up for each key action, and whose task it is to ensure that the research is devised and followed through in such a way as to facilitate the transfer of the innovative results onto the market, should broadly comply with the relevant structural and regional policies, for instance by means of the conference of national and Community networks recommended by the Committee(2), to which the units should be associated. 6. 4. The setting up of European Advisory Groups for each key action or homogeneous groups of key actions, together with networks of national advisory groups, will enable closer contact to be made with the decision- makers of the Structural Funds. In the Committee’s (1) OJ C 407, 28. 12. 1998. (2) OJ C 284, 14. 9. 1998. view, this link is highly appropriate and should therefore be assiduously supported by the Commission. 6. 5. In respect of the implementation of the Fifth Framework Programme, the Committee had called for permanent platforms to be set up for dialogue between experts, industry, decisionmakers and users, as well as economic and social interest groups. These could also constitute a useful link with the relevant levels of action of the Structural Funds Support Frameworks. 6. 6. The opportunities for decentralized management granted by the Fifth Framework Programme for the key actions ‘SMEs and innovation’ and ‘Improving human research potential and the socio-economic knowledge base’ could provide a vital link with the regional authorities responsible for implementing Community structural policies, for example in the sphere of ‘super- visory committees’. The Committee reiterates the importance of the 6. 7. anticipated strengthening of the regional partnership schemes of the Support Frameworks, which should enable research centres in the regions (universities, public and private research centres, companies) to become active participants, thereby meeting the demand for combined action on RTDD and cohesion. More specifically, the Committee stresses the importance of using, from a technology/innovation standpoint, local employment initiatives and territorial pacts [see recent Committee opinion on the subject (1)]. 7. New forms of integrated action: procedures and methods 7. 1. In the Committee’s view, the simplification of Community mechanisms and procedures and combined action, should take precedence over the proliferation of action plans and programmes with different implemen- tation procedures, as the latter have done nothing but create confusion and alienation among potential users. 7. 2. In this regard, the Committee has repeatedly stressed the fundamental need to create special links between RTDD and cohesion instruments to make them more user-friendly. It is also concerned about the outcome of the combined efforts of the inter-DG ad hoc group to deal with the problems raised by the various procedural approaches of the different instruments, differing implementation methods, and the range of timescales and decision-making and management methods. C 40/18 EN Official Journal of the European Communities 15. 2. 1999 7. 3. Concerning the reform of the Structural Funds, greater space should be given to integration with the research-innovation-market process. A certain flexibility should be maintained, however, with regard to the automatic, synchronized and simplified procedures, in line with the new approach of the Fifth Framework Programme on RTD and future programmes. remain within the 75 % limit on RTD aid laid down by the WTO agreements and are compatible with the Community research aid system determined by EC competition policy. 7. 4. The new Structural Funds operations, in particu- lar, should be increasingly demand-led and potential demand should be sustained and boosted, especially in the less developed regions. The operations should also be guided by the Europe-wide extension of demand. the RIS Demand-led action could be increased if (Regional Innovation Strategies) projects were converted from pilot strategies with few resources to ‘strong’ strategies with adequate funding. 7. 4. 1. In the Committee’s view, circulation and exchange at regional level of the most successful experi- ences should be facilitated by replicating successful institutional arrangements for bringing together oper- ators and decision-makers with a view to expanding the capacity for absorption of the Structural Funds and exploiting the opportunities provided by the Business Innovation Centre networks. The reform of the Structural Funds and the triple 7. 5. system for Community initiatives should leave adequate space for the Interreg initiative. Interreg could play an important role in bringing together the ‘sleeping bird’ and ‘wild cat’ regions and the more advanced regions, known as the ‘cash cows’ and ‘stars’ of Europe, allowing an interregional comparison of systems with different features and speeds. 7. 6. Interreg could prove to be particularly important for closer links between the Europe of 15 and the applicant countries. In these areas, action implemented under the Structural Funds and the pre-accession funds is vital in order to create and/or reinforce common ground between the two sides and to establish synergies between not only cohesion and RTDD but also between the instruments for cooperation and technical/economic assistance. This applies equally to joint action in the Euro-Mediterranean area. 7. 7. Lastly, the Committee stresses the importance of clarifying the possibilities of jointly operating several Community instruments to the same end, provided they 7. 8. The possibility of operating within such margins is particularly important to ensure that the new advanced technologies, notably those of the information society, are not counterproductive with regard to cohesion. In other words, that they do not result in an increase of inequality and exclusion, which may be the case if the action lacks ‘critical mass’. 7. 9. The battle against social exclusion must be waged not only on behalf of the weaker members of society but also of the less favoured regions, which are even more geographically marginalized by the lack of structural and infrastructural networks connected to the rest of the EU. Technological progress must be made by integrating different levels — Community, national and regional — to develop cutting-edge technology together with pervasive, horizontal technologies that are able to foster development in for instance those low-tech industrial sectors that need advanced production pro- cesses in order to withstand growing international competition. 7. 10. Integrating support for training policy with support for research policy is crucial to ensuring the competitiveness and development of the European sys- tem and bringing retraining into line with the require- ments of constant technological progress, in order to avoid social exclusion and marginalization. Promoting cooperation between universities, training bodies at different levels and industry is essential in this field too, if training models are to be devised which can boost the capacity of human resources to cope with complex and constantly changing problems. 8. Control and monitoring systems The mapping out of needs, the establishment of 8. 1. RTD and innovation indicators from a structural point of view, together with industrial and technological assessment and benchmarking of business innovation support should be accomplished in accordance with harmonized method- ologies, and be covered by systematic and up-dated structures and infrastructures 15. 2. 1999 EN Official Journal of the European Communities C 40/19 synopses at Community and decentralized level, access- ible to those involved in research and innovation, particularly in SMEs, and to national and Community decision-makers, so that they can ‘establish the long-term strategic objectives of RTD and innovation policies’. 8. 2. The importance of ‘technological monitoring’ mechanisms and industrial and technological assess- ment, as well as the benchmarking of existing regional structures and infrastructure, and of disseminating and applying the best practices thereby identified, has been stressed on several occasions in the above-mentioned recent Committee opinions, and in its opinion on benchmarking: an instrument available to economic actors and public authorities (1). They will provide both a real service to businesses, keeping them up to date on the best available technology, and guidelines for the decision-makers at different levels. They will also spread the local or regional best practices recorded in Europe. 8. 3. Lastly, the Committee emphasizes the need for precise indicators on the state of RTD and innovation which will allow structural action to be assessed and (1) OJ C 296, 9. 7. 1997. Brussels, 2 December 1998. monitored. It also recommends close coordination with the performance indicators currently being drawn up for the Fifth Framework Programme. The experience gained in the preparation of the ‘Second European Report on S & T Indicators 1997’ and from the European Innovation Monitoring System and the ESTO (European Science and Technology Observatory) and the Institute for Prospective Technological Studies (IPTS) of Seville can also provide guidance. 8. 3. 1. The Committee urges that the MEANS pro- gramme (Methods for Evaluating Activities of a Structur- al Nature) — launched by the Commission in order to boost Europe’s evaluation ability and to pool know-how in this area — be developed appropriately and linked with the Fifth Framework Programme on RTD instru- ments. 8. 4. This system of indicators should be structured in such a way that a true assessment can be made of the practical effects of the combined use of the RTD and structural instruments. Above all, it should allow a calculation to be made of the repercussions on social cohesion, employment, the creation of new businesses and professions and the contribution to competitiveness in its various forms. The President of the Economic and Social Committee Beatrice RANGONI MACHIAVELLI