On 1 July 2017, Estonia took over the rotating Presidency of the Council of the EU, which is the first time Estonia has held the EU Presidency since they joined the union in 2004.  Presidencies work together in groups of three, called a 'Trio Presidency’.  The trio set out some common long-term goals and topics that will be addressed by the Council over an 18-month period, aside from their  own detailed six-month programme.  The Estonian Presidency is the first phase of the current trio and will be succeeded by Bulgaria and Austria.

While the last cut-off dates of the 2017 SME Instrument call for proposals are approaching, it is already time to look ahead and share some details about what applicants should expect by the new calls to be launched under the 2018-2020 Work Programmes.

Schuman Associates analysed a draft version of the new European Innovation Council pilot WP 2018-2020 that, on top of the SME Instrument, also include three other innovation support schemes: Fast Track to Innovation (FTI), FET Open and Inducement Prizes. All these schemes have been adapted to support market-creating innovation more effectively, also taking into account recommendations collected from the Horizon 2020 interim evaluation.

12 months after the announcement of the ambitious EU External Investment Plan, President Junker in his State of the Union Address 2017 called upon all Member States to show solidarity by increasing their aid commitment to Africa. When speaking about the pressures several Member States are experiencing under the growing number of migrants coming from Africa, the President highlighted the role of different financial instruments that the EU has put in place to manage the migration flows.

During a two-hour online meeting held at the beginning of September B-WISER consortium took stock of the activities carried out within Work Package 1 and started discussions for the launch of WP2.