IDEA Consult helps underpin future Flemish science and innovation policy

Every year, the Flemish government earmarks some 4.5 billion euros for its economic, science and innovation policy. One of the ways it does this is by supporting institutions that implement this policy. The Scientific Research Fund of Flanders (in Dutch: Het Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Vlaanderen (FWO)), the strategic research centre (in Dutch: De Vlaamse Instelling voor Technologisch Onderzoek (VITO)), F.T.I non-profit organisation (better known as the do-centre for science and technology Technopolis in Mechelen) and 'Eos Wetenschap' are such supported organisations with which the Flemish government has concluded a five-year cooperation agreement. Together, they account for some 520 million euros of support per year. In this, FWO and VITO focus mainly on stimulating and supporting fundamental and strategic basic research (FWO) on the one hand and conducting independent research in the field of cleantech and sustainable development (VITO) on the other. In turn, F.T.I and 'Eos Wetenschap' are structural partners in popularising science and science communication.

Commissioned by the Department of Economy, Science and Innovation of the Flemish government, IDEA Consult will evaluate these 4 supported initiatives in the spring of 2023. The insights and recommendations resulting from these evaluations will be used in the conclusion of new five-year cooperation agreements between the Flemish government and these institutions.

With these studies, IDEA Consult strengthens its distinctly strong position in evaluation of Flemish science and innovation policy:

• We are already evaluating the FWO for the third time in a row.
• The last evaluation of imec and VIB, 2 other strategic research centres were done by us and now we are adding the evaluation of VITO. For Flanders Make, the fourth strategic research centre, we carried out the last impact measurement.
• Science communication is one of our distinct areas of expertise after the successful evaluations of various actors in the previous evaluation round 5 years ago, and the evaluation of RVO-Society and the Flemish People's Observatories and the accompanying system evaluation science communication in spring 2022.