EPWS is glad that the Helsinki Group has asked for our assistance in disseminating their response to the Green Paper ‘From Challenges to Opportunities: Towards a Common Strategic Framework for EU Research and Innovation funding’.

The Helsinki Group, as the Advisory Committee to the European Commission on Gender and Research since 1999, welcomes the opportunity to comment on the Green Paper From Challenges to Opportunities: Towards a Common Strategic Framework for EU Research and Innovation funding.

Questions number 7 and 24 particularly draws its attention. Gender balance and the gender dimension in content of research and innovation are already admitted to be of great importance for the European Commission. But the Helsinki Group wishes the Commission would play a leading role in Europe on this issue if the EU is to meet the challenges of research and innovation in Europe in the current economic context of increasing competition by emerging global players.
Notably, the Helsinki Group strongly recommends that the Commission implements gender analysis in the evaluation criteria for research funding and proposes that the Commission establishes a new program on Gender in Research and Innovation whose main objective will be to implement the Structural Change (modernizing academic institutions) that the Commission intends to adopt in 2012, as suggested by the Council of Competitiveness Conclusions of May 2010.

On behalf of the Helsinki Group,
Ms. Caroline BELAN-MENAGIER,
French representative in the Helsinki Group
Policy Officer
Mission Parité et Lutte contre les Discriminations (MIPADI)
Equal Opportunities and Anti-Discrimination Office,
Strategic and Territory Coordination Unit,
Ministry of Higher Education and Research
75005 PARIS, FRANCE
Helsinki Group website