INCOBRA - Increasing International Science, Technology and Innovation Cooperation between Brazil and the European Union

A New Era of Blue Enlightenment, held in Lisbon from 12th to 14th of July, 2017, celebrated the launch of the South Atlantic Flagship Initiative between the European Union, Brazil and South Africa, through the signature of the Belem Statement.

The initiative aim to provide better understanding and deepened scientific knowledge of marine ecosystems and the interrelations between oceans and climate change, oceans and food, oceans and energy systems, as well as the dynamics of the Atlantic Ocean and its interconnected Circulation Systems from Antarctica to the Artic.

As an EU-BR priority area, Marine Research is one of the topics addressed by INCOBRA. To this end, INCOBRA project has given support to the participation of Brazilian researchers in the event and have organized a session on EU-BR cooperation in Marine Research. The INCOBRA session demonstrated how the project can contribute to the EU-BR cooperation in Marine Research, by setting the scene on the current cooperation standards, on one side, and by addressing future perspectives, on the other side.

INCOBRA session had the participation of representatives from the Brazilian Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation and Communications (MCTIC), the European Commission (EC), the Council for State Funding Agencies in Brazil (CONFAP) and the State Funding Agency from Santa Catarina (FAPESC). The interventions highlighted H2020 as a tool to strengthen the EU-Brazil cooperation in Marine Research and underlined the Brazilian programmes opportunities available to the implementation of the Belem Statement.

The session was full of European and Brazilian actors interested in working together and stablishing collaboration through the use of the funding mechanisms presented by the policy actors and thus putting into practice this new political instrument, the Belem Statement.