Image: European Union
Two new posts approved for outgoing R&D commissioner Carlos Moedas
Carlos Moedas, the outgoing EU R&D commissioner, is to take up new roles on the boards of a Paris-based think tank and an initiative from Unseco, the UN agency for education, science and culture.
He will serve on the advisory board of the Unesco Futures of Education initiative, in which an international team is preparing an agenda for education, knowledge and learning “in a world of increasing complexity, uncertainty and precarity”, according to the European Commission.
The team will consult with young people, educators, civil society, governments and businesses before producing the agenda in late 2021, the Commission said. The advisory board will provide strategic guidance, it said, “notably by taking stock of reviews of research and syntheses of consultations, leveraging specialised expertise from various institutions and developing outreach strategies”.
Although the role is related to Moedas’s portfolio, the Commission approved him taking the post in a decision on 13 November, saying the role does not present any risk.
Moedas will also join the board of directors of the Jacques Delors Institute, also known as Notre Europe. In an approval decision on 26 November, the Commission described the think tank—founded by the eponymous former Commission president—as “widely respected”.
According to the Commission, the think tank focuses on promoting Europe; increasing awareness among European citizens; analysing European current events to offer decision makers innovative proposals; and on disseminating the ideas of Delors.
There Moedas will join former trade commissioner Pascal Lamy, who is the think tank’s former president and current president emeritus. Moedas tasked a team led by Lamy with drawing up recommendations for the future of the EU’s R&D programmes, which was published in 2017.