Minister unterstützen ETI unter Vorbehalt[en][fr] 

The Council agreed on 25 June 2007 on a 'general approach' on the draft Regulation aimed at establishing a European Institute of Technology (EIT). This means that there is a broad consensus on the substance of a legal act, but that further fine-tuning is required for a political agreement, effected before year-end.

The ministers agreed on establishing the EIT with a two-step approach, proposed by Germany. This means that, in the first phase, only two or three Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs) will be set up, instead of the six initially proposed by the Commission. Further KICs, as well as a longer-term strategy for the EIT as a whole will only be developed in a second step, the launch of which will be subject to evaluation of the institute's activities and deliverables.

Ministers expect to finalise the fine-tuning and to achieve an agreement with the European Parliament at first reading during the upcoming Portuguese Presidency, by the end of 2007. 

The fine-tuning will mainly concern financial aspects with the Council agreement of 25 June fixing the Community financing at €308.7 million for the initial six-year period (2008-2013). This money would be taken from the EU's long term budget's competitiveness under heading 1a. Other stakeholders participating in the KIC's are expected to contribute around €1.7 billion.

However, the Parliament does not approve of the EIT being financed at the expense of other important competitiveness programmes under this heading and asks for the EIT to be funded with fresh money (no funding was initially foreseen for the EIT in the financial perspective 2007-1013). 

As a result, the quick agreement sought on the institute might be delayed. However, it is still possible to bring negotiations to an end before the end of the year, if a compromise is found via trialogue discussions between the Commission, Council and Parliament.

The Parliament's Industry and Research Committee was set to vote on the issue on 26 June, but decided to postpone the vote to 9 July as the Budget Committee, which adopted its Opinion on the dossier on 11 June, is continuing negotiations on the budget with the Council and Commission. The Parliament's first reading is scheduled for 26 September 2007.