‘’Israel is a country where creativity and curiosity-driven innovations are a normal everyday reality. Israel's successful and dynamic innovation ecosystem is an inspiration," said European Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation as he opened a conference in the European Parliament marking 20 years of EU-Israel partnership.

‘’Dreaming big in Israel has given the world many breakthroughs. Such as drugs against Parkinson's and cancer, even the invention of the USB stick,’’ he added.

The conference saw the participation of top researchers and investors from Israel and the EU.

Israel was the first ever non-European country to be associated to the EU Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development.

Today, Israel is an active participant in Horizon 2020, the EU’s flagship programme for research and innovation.

Recently, in an interim evaluation of the programme it was published that Israel is ranked second after Switzerland, with the highest success rates in the tenders.

The academic communities in Israel and Europe interact closely by tackling common challenges together. : “Israel’s participation in H2020 brought great benefits to both sides,” stressed Aharon Aharon, CEO of the Israel Innovation Authority.

In 20 years of partnership, Israeli investment in the EU programme was around €1.375 billion, while the return to Israeli entities in the form of grants reached €1.7 billion. Over 3,000 projects submitted by Israeli entities were approved involving 4,435 participants.

Israel spends about 4.1% of GDP on R&D. Since the beginning of the Horizon 2020 programme, some 76,400 requests for funding were made in the first two years alone, of which 9,200 projects were approved, at a total cost of €15.9 billion. Of the projects approved, 600 projects included Israeli participants. The total funding for projects involving Israelis amounted to €370 million.

"We want to deepen the research and innovation partnership and specifically reach out to the start-up culture in Israel," said German MEP Christian EHLER, from the European People’s Party (EPP) group who co-hosted the conference.

His Greek colleague Eva Kaili, member of the Socialists and Democrats group (S&D) mentioned that ‘’there is still room to expand EU-Israel cooperation."

Next week, the European Parliament will host another conference showcasing the recent development of Jerusalem as a high-tech hub and global leader in fostering tech-companies, accelerators and incubators.

Organized by the European Jewish Association (EJA) and hosted by German Conservative MEP Arne Gericke, the conference will hear the CEO’s of some of the world’s most innovative start-ups and those Israeli NGO’s tasked with supporting them.

Experts will explain how the model can be exported to cities across the European Union as a major tool for economic development and regeneration.