ESFRI organisation and capacity

The organisation and form of the ESFRI Forum is fit for purpose in fulfilling its objectives and providing an effective platform for both the RI policy discussions and the preparation and implementation of the methodology for RI evaluation and monitoring. Nevertheless, as the processes linked to the ESFRI Roadmap have been to a large extent carried out internally, they put significant pressure on ESFRI’s capacity.

ESFRI’s unique capacity to contribute to the coordination and development of European RIs rests heavily on the work conducted by the six Strategy Working Groups (SWGs) and the Implementation Group (IG). These groups consist of high-level dedicated experts from ESFRI Member States. It is because of the vast competence in these groups that ESFRI can carry out the evaluations necessary for ESFRI’s Landscape Analysis, Roadmap, and monitoring. The SWGs bring much of the scientific competence of ESFRI and are also engaged in a range of ad hoc activities.

In the implementation of its mandate as well as the related tasks and activities, ESFRI benefits from a substantial support structure which has in general proved effective. The support to ESFRI’s activities is threefold: a) the ESFRI Executive Secretariat, provided in-kind by the EC, b) the ESFRI Chair secretariat and secretariats of Executive Board Members and Working Group Chairs offered by the corresponding MS/AC, and c) the EU Framework Programme project-based support (CoPoRI, StR-ESFRI, StR-ESFRI 2). The current setting in general serves the purpose and the participation of EC at appropriate levels across all ESFRI activities is very important.

However, as the European RI landscape has become richer and more mature, ESFRI’s mandate has been substantially expanded. The growing number of activities has resulted in substantial pressure on the resources available as each of the four components of the ESFRI support structure assumed more tasks and responsibilities. Moreover, ESFRI’s operations are critically dependent on all the four components working in close synergy, but as none of these components has assured sustainability in the long term, this creates a significant risk.

For ESFRI to effectively respond to the new ambition for European science and European Research Infrastructures, ESFRI needs to revisit its organisation and support structures. This requires a more sustainable structure around the Forum with increased operational capacity, providing ESFRI and its Secretariat with additional means to further delegate the implementation of operational tasks. Ideally, the reinforced support structure should be independent from the cycles of ESFRI Chair elections and project cycles of the EU Framework Programme. ESFRI also continually needs to consider the workload put on the SWGs and IG, securing that ESFRI can continue to benefit in a sustainable manner from input from the European research community.