Stand alone Staff Working document on the Interim Evaluation of the European Defence Fund
Date: 2024-01-24
Institutions: Directorate-General for Defence Industry and Space, European Commission
Subjects: industrial policy



PART-2024-27548V1.docx











CALL FOR EVIDENCE 


FOR AN EVALUATION / FITNESS CHECK 











Title of the evaluation




European Defence Fund – interim evaluation






Lead DG – responsible unit 




Directorate-General Defence Industry and Space






Indicative timetable 




Planned start date: Q4-2023


Planned completion dates: Q1-2025






Additional information




The European Defence Fund (EDF) (europa.eu)


Call for evidence - interim evaluation of the European Defence Fund






A. Political context, purpose and scope of the evaluation






Political context 






As indicated in Regulation (EU) 2021/697 setting up the European Defence Fund (EDF) for 2021-2027 (budget: EUR 7.9 billion), the general objective of the EDF is to foster the competitiveness, efficiency and innovation capacity of the European defence technological base throughout the EU, thereby contributing to the EU’s strategic autonomy and freedom of action. In practice, the EDF incentivises and supports collaborative, cross-border research and development in the area of defence to increase the EU’s technological edge and develop the capabilities that are key for the strategic autonomy and resilience of the EU and its Member States and the protection of its citizens. Complementing and amplifying Member States’ efforts, the Fund promotes cooperation between companies and research actors of all sizes and all geographical origins in the EU. 


As indicated in Article 29 (2) of the EDF Regulation, an interim evaluation of the EDF must be carried out once there is sufficient information available about its implementation, and no later than 4 years after its launch. The interim evaluation must cover the period until 31 July 2024, and its results will feed into the impact assessment of any successor initiative and into the final evaluation of the EDF to be performed by 2031. To take account of lessons learnt from the precursor programmes, the interim evaluation of the EDF will also incorporate a retrospective evaluation of the 2019-2021 European Defence Industrial Development Programme (EDIDP) programme (Article 17 EDIDP Regulation), as well as an analysis of the achievements from the Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR) programme (2017-2019). The interim evaluation will cover all EU-27 Member States and Norway, an Associated Country to the programme.


The evaluation must be performed in line with the better regulation guidelines applicable to all EU expenditure programmes and address the evaluation criteria of relevance, coherence, efficiency, effectiveness and EU added value. It will look at the progress made in implementing the programme and assess whether corrective actions are needed to deliver on its intended objectives as planned. 


The European Commission is conducting this evaluation between Q4-2023 and Q1-2025 and will communicate its results to the co-legislators and make them publicly available for wider dissemination.






Purpose and scope 






The interim evaluation of the EDF aims to provide the evidence needed to inform the decision making process on possible needs for adaptations of the programme in the short (current implementation period) and longer term (post 2027). As per Article 29 (2) of the EDF Regulation, the interim evaluation will also address the extent which the implementation of EDF took into account the lessons learned from the precursor programmes PADR (2017-2019) and EDIDP (2019-2021), in particular as regards the simplification potential. 


Overall, the evaluation will provide insights into the relevance of the programme and of its design, an analysis of the first achievements against the defined objectives of the related Regulation, the drivers and barriers to progress, and provide, to the extent possible, an initial assessment of the costs and benefits of the intervention for the stakeholders and beneficiaries, in particular for SMEs and mid-caps.


Based on the Better Regulation framework for evaluation, and based on requirements sets out in Article 29 (2) of the EDF Regulation, the interim evaluation will more specifically focus on:


·The implementation state of play of the EDF as well as lesson learned from EDIDP and PADR; 


·The relevance of the programme, of its governance and of its focus given the needs to be addressed and the evolving socio-economic, geopolitical, scientific and technological context;  


·The first indications of its effectiveness in delivering the expected outputs and results towards its objectives, by looking at the progress of EDF projects so far (a more complete assessment of effectiveness will be done for the final evaluation in 2031), but also achievements from PADR and EDIDP;


·An assessment of the efficiency of the implementation processes given the requirements defined in the EDF Regulation concerning the interim evaluation (incl. rates of reimbursements of indirect costs, provisions related to independent experts, implementation of ethics procedure), the funding distribution (incl. amounts allocated for disruptive technologies), participation patterns (incl. analysis of cross-border participation, level of involvement of SMEs and mid-caps), etc. and the estimated costs and benefits, identifying potential for further burden reduction and simplification;


·Coherence: an analysis of the positioning, complementarity and coordination of EDF interventions with international, EU and national relevant defence initiatives and tools for defence research and development, as well of including the Capability Development Plan (CDP), the Coordinated Annual Review on Defence (CARD) and Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO);


·An assessment of the added value of acting at European level with the EDF compared to defence R&D investments at national level. 







B. Better regulation






Consultation strategy 






The consultation activities for the interim evaluation aim to gather evidence and inputs on the EDF implementation and performance from key stakeholders in order to reach a measured judgement on how well the programme has performed during the evaluated timeframe. As the EDF field of intervention is very specific, requiring technical expertise and handling of non-public information, a targeted consultation approach will be applied based on the voluntary submission of evidence and position papers from stakeholders, coupled with interviews, surveys, case studies and workshops. 


Comments to this call for evidence may be submitted during 4 weeks following publication of the call for evidence on the Have your Say portal (public submission). In parallel, a dedicated functional mailbox DEFIS-EDF-INTERIM@ec.europa.eu is open to receive additional information such as position papers. The call for evidence will also be published on DG Defence Industry and Space website on the dedicated EDF section of the page, and will be promoted under the European Commission Funding and Tender Opportunities Portal. 


A synopsis report providing a summary of all the consultation results will be prepared and annexed to the Staff Working Document on the interim evaluation to be published, with due consideration of confidentiality and sensitivity of information. 


The consultation targets private entities and public organisations involved in the implementation of the EDF in the Member States/Norway, as well as relevant research centres and academia and international and inter-governmental organisations engaged in defence activities, including the European Defence Agency (EDA) and the Organisation for Joint Armament Cooperation (OCCAR) which are involved in EDF actions carried out in indirect management. The consultation aims to gather both the views of the different types of beneficiaries, including SMEs and mid-caps, as well as stakeholders which are not currently participating in the actions supported by the Fund to understand the drivers and barriers to participation. 


In line with the European Commission’s Better Regulation policy to develop initiatives informed by the best available knowledge, we also invite researchers, as well as academic organisations, learned societies, and associations with expertise in defence policies, to submit relevant published and pre-print scientific research, analyses and data to our functional mailbox. 


We are particularly interested in submissions that analyse the implementation of the EDF/EDIDP/PADR: for example, whether the priorities, calls and projects are relevant with regards to current defence challenges; whether innovation and disruptive technologies have been factored in well; how effective the programmes are in supporting collaborative actions and cross-border cooperation; and if there should be a stronger shift from research to development and procurement considering geopolitical events.






Data collection and methodology [max 10 lines]






Due to the early stages of EDF implementation (first projects started at the end of 2021) and as already anticipated in the EDF impact assessment, there is limited data at this point in time to assess the performance of the EDF in terms of results since none of the projects have yet been completed. Therefore, the very nature of the interim evaluation will be to assess the progress made and lessons learned with EDF implementation so far. However, data on the precursor programmes PADR and EDIDP may give further evidence on the outcomes of completed projects and lessons learned. 


Data on EDF project implementation and performance will be processed by Commission services to feed into the evaluation in line with data confidentiality rules, in particular by publishing only non-confidential and/or aggregated data. Data on participation in the EDF will feed into a mapping of beneficiaries and a set of case studies will also be conducted allowing to identify barriers and drivers to progress. A contractor will support stakeholder consultations and research work. 


The evaluation will analyse programme documentation, including the EDF Multi-Annual Perspective and the annual Work Programmes, position/policy papers from key stakeholders, dedicated reports from  key EU bodies as well as data related to the defence industry and its R&D activities from EEAS (including EUMS), EDA, Eurostat and other key partners (such as NATO and selected third countries as appropriate).