ESFRI Events
Global Science Forum-ESFRI Workshop on assessing public expenditures committed to RIs
OECD (Global Science Forum) and the European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) co-organise an online workshop dedicated to the investigation of the demands from relevant stakeholders regarding RI funding data, existing data-gathering mechanisms for RI funding and their limits, what funding could reasonably be assessed (should this include restricted or categorised definitions of RIs, specific phases of the RI life cycle, full cost of RIs or only elements that are more easy to investigate) and how better standardised RI funding information might be generated.
The workshop will take place on 10 July 2024 and will be fully virtual.
Background
Research infrastructures (RIs) play a critical role in the scientific enterprise. They are now an essential component for all scientific domains and not only allow to push the boundaries of existing knowledge and the production of breakthrough research but they also play a major role in structuring the research system through the development of networks, of user communities and of rich ecosystems that bring together many research and innovation stakeholders.
This increasing role of RIs in the science system, and the increasing complexity of RIs, has led to a steady increase in their funding requirements: not only have RIs become a necessity in all scientific disciplines, but the cost of individual RIs can reach billions or even tens of billion euros. While data is readily available on total research funding in each country, the same cannot be said for the share of funding specific to RIs. Only a few countries are currently able to provide approximate estimates, and even in such cases, these estimates do not always reflect the contributions from all domestic players. Estimating RI funding is complex for several reasons:
This increasing role of RIs in the science system, and the increasing complexity of RIs, has led to their a steady increase in their funding requirement: not only have RIs become a necessity in all scientific disciplines, but the cost of individual RIs can reach billions or even tens of billion euros. While data is readily available on total research funding in each country, the same cannot be said for the share of funding specific to RIs. Only a few countries are currently able to provide rough estimates, and even in such cases, estimates do not always reflect the contributions from all domestic players. Estimating RI funding is complex for several reasons:
- There is no single definition of what is a research infrastructures. In recent years, the term has been used to categorise: single pieces of large research equipment (such as an electron microscope); very large distributed networks of monitoring sensors (such as arrays of buoys); virtually accessible databases; and, complex international projects spanning several continents… While there is an agreement on a few common general principles (typically RIs are considered as facilities that provide resources and services for the research communities to conduct research and foster innovation in their fields, and usually are open to users outside the laboratory or institution that hosts the facility), this can still include a vast diversity of equipment or sets of instruments, scientific collections, archives, scientific data etc.
- Funding may address the different phases of the life cycle of RIs (conception/design, construction, operation, upgrades, phasing out).
- RI funding may come from very different sources, supporting different elements (investment, staff, projects, international partnerships…) and this is often very context specific as countries have different mechanisms and processes to support these different elements.
While there are indications that RI investments are indeed increasing steadily and, in some case, the funders indicate that this has reached their funding capacity, it is unclear whether the share dedicated to infrastructure is growing commensurately or faster than total public investments into R&D, and how RI funding is distributed between new RIs, participation to international RI projects, needs for upgrading existing facilities or just operating RIs and providing user access.
The availability of reliable RI funding data (e.g., RI funding trends, funding distribution along different needs…) alongside trends in research funding would enrich discussions around RI planning and financing for funding and decision-making stakeholders.
This workshop, which is co-organised by the OECD (Global Science Forum) and the European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) explores the demands from relevant stakeholders regarding RI funding data. It looks into existing data-gathering mechanisms and their limits, what funding can reasonably be assessed (should this include restricted or categorised definitions of RIs, specific phases of the RI life cycle, full cost of RIs or only elements that are more easy to investigate) and how better standardised RI funding information might be generated.
Roadmap 2026 InfoDay
The ESFRI Strategic Report on RIs in Europe, known as the ESFRI Roadmap, has been, for the past 22 years, the prestigious result of a laborious collaborative process aspiring to guarantee the creation of and access to large European Research Infrastructures with the vision to expand European scientific excellence.
ESFRI organises an Information Day, on 8 October 2024 in Brussels, to kick-off the process of updating its Roadmap (to be completed in 2026). Top Roadmap stakeholders will provide a thorough presentation of the requirements, the procedure and the methodology of selection of proposals for new RI Projects to enter the Roadmap. There will also be further presentations on the monitoring of ESFRI RI projects already on the Roadmap.
The Info Day will last the whole morning of the 8 October (09:00-13:45 CEST) and will be hosted by the European Commission in Brussels.
Attendance requires physical presence and registration is open to all, until maximum venue capacity is reached. We expect that
- max 1 person per existing ESFRI RI project or other stakeholder organisation can be accommodated
- at least one person per provisional new project proposal can be accommodated
Please express your interest to attend the InfoDay via the registration form.
ESFRI-EOSC Task Force Workshop with ESFRI Science Clusters
The ESFRI Science Clusters plan to publish a Position Statement on EOSC. Prior to its open dissemination, they would like to present it and discuss it with representatives of key stakeholders, including the EC, ESFRI and EOSC boards, EOSC-A. To this end, The ESFRI-EOSC Task Force organizes a consultation workshop to discuss the upcoming ESFRI Clusters position statement, on March 1, 2024.
Participation to the workshop is available by invitation only.
ESFRI-EOSC Policy Workshop on "FAIR Data Productivity and Advanced Digitalization"
Note: The discussions and recommendations of the Workshop have been included in this document: FAIR Data productivity and advanced digitalization of research, available on Zenodo
The ESFRI-EOSC Task Force is organising a Policy Workshop on “FAIR Data Productivity and Advanced Digitalization”, on 23-24 January 2024, in Milan, Italy. The Workshop is aimed at identifying bottlenecks in the productivity of quality-assessed FAIR data and the impact of Artificial Intelligence on research.
The first goal of the workshop is to analyse the current situation and the perspectives in the productivity of FAIR data sets, with appropriate quality assessment and technical features to make them user- and machine-actionable for refinement of research results and for new research.
The second goal is to address the opportunities and implications of Artificial Intelligence in research, in connection with FAIR data (training of algorithms and FAIRification). These issues will be addressed through talks and roundtable discussions led by experts from ESFRI RIs and European projects in the AI landscape.
Please note that participation is available by-invitation only, and its acceptance implies in-person attendance.
Attendees will include the ESFRI-EOSC Task Force, EOSC Steering Board, representatives from the EC (DG-RTD, DG-CNECT), the EOSC-Association Board, ESFRI RIs, and ESFRI SWGs. The workshop is organised by the ESFRI-EOSC Task Force, with the support of the StR-ESFRI3 project.
ESFRI Follow-up Workshop on RI Funding Questionnaire
The Competitive Council in its Conclusions on Research Infrastructures adopted on 2/12/2022, acknowledged that the RI funding requires strategic investments through the entire RI life-cycle, which spreads over decades. It encouraged Member States to form a sustainable political commitment on long-term funding of RIs. Moreover, it invited Member States and the Commission through ESFRI to perform an analysis of the types of financial support to the European RIs throughout their life-cycle, identify good practices and synergies of various RI funding resources, and explore appropriate RI funding models and corresponding RI funding initiatives.
Against this background, ESFRI has established a drafting group in charge of analysing the topic in detail and preparing recommendations. The ESFRI Drafting Group on RI Funding elaborated a questionnaire and addressed it to the European research infrastructures. The questionnaire was available on-line from February 14th till April 20th 2023.
A Follow-up online Workshop is organised on June 23, 2023, from 13:00 to 15:00 CET, for RI representatives contributing to this survey. This workshop aims to discuss with the Research infrastructures the information gathered from this questionnaire.
Some of the issues should be tackled via the direct dialogue with the research infrastructures in order to better understand their feedback:
Participation in the Workshop is available by invitation-only.
Webinar | Scientific Data about Society in Ukraine
Ukraine in European Research Infrastructures in the Social Sciences and Humanities
22 May 2023, 09:30-12:30 CEST
Organised by EASSH in cooperation with the ESFRI Strategic Working Group Social and Cultural Innovation
The webinar aims to be a mutual learning opportunity for involvement of Ukraine in research infrastructures, addressing research infrastructure-practitioners, funders from the European, national and private level as well as delegates from ESFRI and national research infrastructures.
It will give the floor to research infrastructures that have already started cooperation with Ukraine to talk about their lessons learnt and challenges encountered. Also, the webinar intends to highlight the potential impact of social sciences and humanities research infrastructures for different policy areas.
It will finally highlight current funding gaps and opportunities. The discussion will be concluded by a proposal for next steps in collaboration in the near future.
Please register in this link to get access.
Find here the full agenda and motivation of this event.
Consultation for Delegates | ESFRI's approach on RI Impact Assessment | 30 May 2023 | Online
ESFRI is conscious of the importance of RIs impact assessment, including on the sustainability of RIs, and has formed a drafting group to elaborate on the topic, tasked with preparing a report based on information collected from literature and questionnaires to the ESFRI member countries and RIs, in the context of the current ESFRI Workplan.
The ESFRI Policy Brief prepared by the drafting group has been published here. This report highlights the importance of understanding the differences between performance monitoring, which ESFRI started implementing last year, and impact assessment of RIs and provides recommendations for stakeholders, policymakers, funders, governments, RIs, ESFRI, and European Commission (EC).
To get more insights from key stakeholders in order to enrich and finalise this report, ESFRI organises an online Consultation Workshop on ESFRI’s approach to RI impact Assessment, on 30 May 2023, 9:30-11:00 CEST.
Participation is limited to ESFRI Delegates.
Please note that a separate Workshop on the same topic will be organised for RIs and Stakeholders. More information here.
ESFRI Workshop on RI Funding Questionnaire
The Competitiveness Council, in their recently adopted conclusions on Research Infrastructures (RIs) (2/12/22), acknowledged that the funding of RIs requires strategic investments through the entire RI life-cycle. Furthermore, the Council invited Member States and the European Commission through ESFRI to perform an analysis of the types of financial support to the European RIs throughout their life-cycle, identify good practices and synergies of various RI funding resources, and explore appropriate funding models and corresponding initiatives.
To this aim, ESFRI established an RI Funding Drafting Group in charge of analysing the topic in detail and preparing recommendations. In order to start the analysis, the RI Funding Drafting Group created a questionnaire, to collect input from Research Infrastructures and national governments and develop a report, mapping funding practices at national and EU levels and providing broad future insights in the scientific and funding needs of RIs.
The RI Funding Drafting Group organizes an online Workshop on 16 February 2023, to assist the representatives in filling in the questionnaire, provide more information on the process and to clarify any questions that may arise.
Participation in the Workshop is available by-invitation-only.
3rd ESFRI Open Session
ESFRI holds Open Sessions at its forums twice a year, to communicate to a wider audience about its activities. They are intended to serve both the ESFRI Delegates and representatives of the ESFRI Research Infrastructures and facilitate both-ways exchange. ESFRI has launched the Open Session initiative as a part of the goals set within the ESFRI White Paper Making Science Happen.
The third ESFRI Open Session is organized as part of the 80th ESFRI Plenary Meeting on 30th June 2022, to discuss Research Infrastructures and Big Data.
Joint EC-ESFRI Workshop: R&I needs of Research Infrastructures
Horizon Europe Research Infrastructures activities under Excellent Science aim at empowering Europe through world-class and accessible Research and Technology Infrastructures. In addition, the ERA Policy Agenda includes an action to strengthen sustainability, accessibility and resilience of research infrastructures.
The European Commission and ESFRI propose to launch discussions to align further the policy on European research infrastructures and the operational support as shaped in the Horizon Europe Strategic Orientations.
The workshop aims at ensuring a shared understanding on R&I needs of research infrastructures, their services, access, instrumentation and technologies. For that purpose, building on the recent analysis by ESFRI of the research infrastructures landscape, it will invite representatives of research infrastructures, of research infrastructures projects, national delegates in relevant Committees to discuss how best to support the development of the RI landscape, the delivering of services, the next generation of instruments, tools and other relevant aspects.
This event is by-invitation only.