EU and Western Balkan partners endorse research cooperation declaration
The European Union and six Western Balkan partners have endorsed a joint declaration on research and innovation at a ministerial meeting in Brussels on 22 October. The declaration is intended to deepen cooperation in the field while reaffirming a shared commitment to the region’s path towards EU membership.
Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia are covered by the agreement. The meeting was hosted by Ekaterina Zaharieva, the Commissioner for Startups, Research and Innovation, and co-chaired by James Lawless, Ireland’s Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science.
Held under the theme “Research and Innovation as accelerators for EU integration”, the meeting focused on research careers and innovation ecosystems. It also included an innovation award for young innovators from the region.
A joint action plan to follow
The new declaration sets out a common ambition rather than a completed programme of measures. Its stated aims are to strengthen research careers, support innovation ecosystems and prepare a new joint Action Plan involving the EU and the six partners.
That distinction matters. The endorsement does not itself allocate new funding, create individual research posts or set a timetable for the action plan. Nor does it change the formal status of any partner’s relationship with the EU. Those matters would require later decisions and, in the case of the action plan, agreement on the specific measures it will contain.
The language used at the meeting puts research and innovation alongside the wider process of European integration. But the declaration does not present scientific cooperation as a substitute for the political, legal and institutional steps involved in that process. It records a shared direction for work in this area and leaves the practical detail to the next stage.
Two decades of the steering platform
This year’s meeting marked the 20th anniversary of the Western Balkans Steering Platform on Research and Innovation. Established in 2006, the forum brings together the European Commission, representatives of the six Western Balkan partners, EU Member States and the wider research and innovation community.
Over that period, the platform has been used to build links between the region and European research programmes. All six partners have become fully associated with successive EU research programmes, a status intended to support participation in collaborative work rather than to settle wider questions about EU membership.
The declaration therefore builds on an existing structure rather than creating a new institution. Its immediate significance is a renewed political commitment across the participants and an instruction to prepare a joint plan. The detailed priorities, delivery arrangements and resources for that plan have not yet been announced.
Existing participation provides context
The region already has a substantial presence in Horizon Europe, the EU’s research and innovation programme. The six partners have secured around €237 million through more than 1,000 projects involving the region. Those figures describe participation already achieved; they are not a new funding award made at the Brussels meeting.
For researchers, universities, businesses and young innovators across the six partners, the planned action plan could become the next framework for cooperation. However, the declaration does not identify particular calls, beneficiaries, projects or award amounts. It would be premature to treat its endorsement as proof that any future initiative has been funded or will deliver a specified outcome.
The next substantive test will be whether the EU and the six partners turn the declaration’s broad priorities into agreed actions. For now, the 22 October meeting has endorsed the direction of travel: closer work on research careers and innovation ecosystems, with a joint Action Plan still to be prepared.
