Horizon Europe: Strategic Plan Development

Open Horizon Europe Strategic plan (pdf)

For the first time in the history of EU Framework Programmes, a 'Strategic Plan' has been developed to underpin the programme and guide work programme development. The plan itself is 'co-designed', meaning that the Commission has to ensure regular and extensive exchanges with relevant actors (European Parliament, Member States, stakeholders and citizens more widely) during its development.

The Strategic Plan is expected to focus in particular on the Global Challenges and European Industrial Competitiveness pillars of Horizon Europe, and should ensure that the programme is implemented in an integrated and coherent way. The plan will also detail -at a strategic level- the expected contributions that can be made to the wider policy objectives of all pillars and parts of Horizon Europe.

Currently, the Strategic Plan is being developed using the Orientations document that is already available on the Commission's website. With a new EU Commission starting its work in late 2019, new political orientations must also now be incorporated into the plan.

Specifically, the new 'Green Deal' objectives must be integrated in addition to other activities defined in the "A Union that strives for more" political guidelines for 2019-2024. It is understood that much of the current work on the Strategic Plan focusses on joining up the new policy priorities with the outcomes of the co-design process, including:

• the expected impacts (for example in the Cluster on Climate, Energy and Mobility "Transition to a climate-neutral society enabled through advanced climate science and responses for climate mitigation and adaptation")
• the Key Strategic Orientations (for example "Leading the way and joining forces internationally for the transition to sustainability")
• other policy priorities (for example "A stronger Europe in the world; European Green Deal; as well as COVID-19 elements") at the cluster level.

The Commission is currently working on the first elements for discussion and analysis, combining the orientations and additional intelligence that the Strategic Plan will take into account. Further discussions on expected impacts and the Key Strategic Orientations are planned for the next meeting of the Horizon Europe Shadow Committee.

Commission Publishes the Implementation Strategy for Horizon Europe

Open Horizon Europe Implementation Strategy (pdf)

The European Commission has published the first version of the Implementation Strategy for Horizon Europe, which sets out how the future programme will be managed in practice to achieve its ambitious objectives.

The Strategy, which allows Horizon Europe to deliver its impacts as efficiently and user-friendly as possible focusses on the following objectives:

• Maximising impacts
• Ensuring greater transparency and further simplification
• Fostering synergies with other EU spending programmes
• Easing access through digital transformation and outreach

The Commission prepared the document following an extensive consultation process, which included dedicated events in Member States, a public online consultation and dedicated sessions at the European R&I Days in September 2019. A report from these activities is available online.

The Strategy is intended to be a living document and further updates, as well as a progress report, are expected later in the year. Work on many elements of the Strategy is well underway and despite the COVID-19 outbreak the intention is to have all the tools, processes and guidance documents in place way before the launch of the first Horizon Europe calls for proposals in early 2021.

To keep subscribers updated on the latest developments, we held a webinar on the Implementation Strategy earlier this week. The presentation slides are now available on the dedicated event page and a useful summary of the Strategy can also be found in our dedicated factsheet.

• Norway in Europe. The Norwegian Government’s strategy for cooperation with the EU 2018–2021.
• Norge i Europa. Regjeringens strategi for samarbeidet med EU 2018-2021.