Horizon outlines Europe’s priorities in research and innovation

The European Commission has outlined three main strategic orientations in the European Union’s (EU) largest research and innovation programme, Horizon Europe Strategic Plan 2025-2027, to “tackle key global challenges”.

Most notably, one of the plan’s key strategic orientations is supporting ‘the digital transition’, with the hope that supplementing research to support this transition will create a “more resilient, competitive, democratic and inclusive Europe”.

Since its creation in 2021, Horizon Europe has been “generating excellence through breakthrough knowledge and investment in solutions to long-term global challenges”, such as climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution, the digital transformation, health threats and an ageing population.

The Horizon Europe Strategic Plan serves as an interface between the EU’s main policy priorities and the Horizon Europe research activities. It strives to ensure the best value and impact for member states and associated countries investment in research and innovation.

The strategy supports many aspects including:

• Continuity and reliability for the research and innovation communities: The plan sets research and innovation priorities beyond the custom two-year period of Horizon Europe work programmes.
• Communication: The plan enables member states, associated countries, stakeholders and the public to engage with the European Commission on future research priorities in a transparent way.
• Synergies with national research and innovation activities: The plan allows member states and associated countries to seek a better alignment of their national and regional research and innovation strategies and activities with EU priorities, by improving coordination and increasing synergies between the national and EU funding.
• Synergies with other EU funding instruments: The plan highlights further opportunities for synergies with other EU funding programmes.

Strategic orientations and the pillars

The three key strategic orientations identified in by Horizon Europe for the 2025-2027 plan are:

• The green transition: Horizon Europe research and innovation activities must support Europe to become the world’s first climate-neutral continent by 2050 and to tackle biodiversity loss and pollution. At least 35 per cent of Horizon Europe’s resources are committed to be spent on climate action and 10 per cent for 2025-2027 on biodiversity action.
• The digital transition: Research to support the digital transition is key to Europe’s competitiveness and open strategic autonomy, and to setting human-centred standards. It is also key to achieving the green transition. In 2021-2027, Horizon agreed to invest at least €13 billion from Horizon Europe in core digital technologies.
• A more resilient, competitive, inclusive, and democratic Europe: Europe’s social rights, democratic values, and principles “need a strong foundation so they can be promoted globally”. Horizon Europe research was established to provide this foundation. This includes research on civil security, on a fair and environmentally friendly economic model, on health and wellbeing, and on democratic participation.

These key strategic orientations have been developed to “encapsulate the main EU policy priorities” which will guarantee “transformed open strategic autonomy… securing Europe’s leading role in developing and deploying critical technologies”.

The plan is also informed by the three pillars of Horizon Europe, which together, with the horizontal part on “widening participation and strengthening the European Research Area (ERA)”, designed to have a “synergetic impact”.

The three pillars are:

Pillar I: Excellent science This pillar supports frontier research and breakthrough scientific ideas (European Research Council), teams up the best researchers from Europe and beyond and equips them with skills and world-class research infrastructures.

Pillar II: Global challenges and European industrial competitiveness The strategic plan focuses primarily on Pillar II of Horizon Europe. The second pillar is made up of six clusters of research an innovation activities, to maximise integration and complementarities across the respective thematic areas while securing high and sustainable levels of impact for the EU in relation to resources that are expended.

Pillar III: Innovative Europe Pillar III focuses on improving the conditions for innovators to flourish at all levels of governance, supports the development of innovations to address EU strategic challenges, such as the green and digital transition, and strengthens EU technological sovereignty, particularly in deep tech and breakthrough innovation.

The strong bridges between pillars and, where relevant, within pillars, call for a broader perspective in the strategic plan, to identify and leverage the reciprocal links, but aforementioned, the strategic plan focuses predominantly on Pillar II and its various ‘clusters’.

Cluster one: Health

The strategy plan states: “Cluster one will continue to improve the understanding of the impacts of climate change and environmental stresses on people’s health and wellbeing and support the development of tools and measurers to protect people from these impacts and to combat global health challenges.”

Cluster one specifies that the Horizon Europe will continue work to develop and stimulate the uptake of new technologies and digital solutions to improve healthcare and health systems. This includes using technology to help people better understand and use health information, promote healthier lifestyles, improve pandemic/epidemic preparedness, prevent diseases, provide better diagnoses and more personalised treatments and care solutions.

Cluster two: Culture, creativity and inclusive society

This cluster aims to make Europe “more resilient, competitive, inclusive and democratic”. The cluster aspires to have research and innovation investment continue to strengthen democracy, increase democratic participation and protect fundamental rights and the rule of law, as well as promote cultural and creative industries and linguistic diversity, “paying particular attention to regional specificities and cultural diversity, as this enriches society as a whole”.

Cluster three: Civil security for society

Cluster three aims to strengthen societal preparedness and resilience to disasters and threats, whether accidental or intentional. It also aims to guarantee the “security of digital networks and of the population in the online world”. Therefore, cluster three promises to invest in cybersecurity research and investment to strengthen the EU’s resilience, protect its infrastructure, and improve its ability to cope with cyberattacks and incidents.

Cluster four: Digital, industry and space

Cluster four aims to both strengthen Europe’s technological sovereignty and competitiveness; and support the transformation of its industries towards net zero emissions. The strategy plan states: “Cluster four will continue fostering leadership in digital and key enabling technologies, including digital and AI, while ensuring that they are aligned with European principles, values and rights.”

Cluster five: Climate, energy and mobility

Cluster five capitalises on the digital transformation to accelerate climate neutrality by 2050. This involves improving climate models, and energy and mobility services. The plan explains: “Cluster five empowers people and organisations through better information and by involving them in co-creating and shaping solutions”, to ensure energy and transport systems become fair, safe and sustainable.

Cluster six: Food, bioeconomy, natural resources, agriculture and environment

Cluster six drives forward the green transition, the first key strategic orientation for Horizon Europe. By supporting the European Green Deal, it “makes Europe more resilient, competitive, inclusive and democratic”. It also aims to promote a circular economy by increasing resource efficiency from design to disposal.

The new Horizon Europe Strategic Plan notes that to achieve the EU’s ambitions reflected in the new orientations, it is also essential to safeguard Europe’s open strategic autonomy and to secure Europe’s leading role in developing and deploying critical and emerging technologies. The six clusters outlined in Pillar II by Horizon Europe as well as all activities under Pillar I and Pillar III, have been designed to support each of the key strategic orientations.