What’s going on in the EU: 25 November to 9 December

This week: R&D spending drops, defence spending rises, concern over Covid mutations and more

R&D spending

The EU spent about €1 billion less on research in 2020 than in 2019, the bloc’s statistics agency Eurostat has revealed. The intensity of R&D spending rose to 2.3 per cent of GDP, up from 2.2 per cent a year earlier, even though actual spending fell to €311bn. Eurostat said this was due to a decrease in GDP as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. The EU has a longstanding target to spend 3 per cent of its GDP on R&D overall, although few of its member states meet this goal.