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WHAT WE DO

The European Defence Agency (EDA) supports its 27 Member States in improving their defence capabilities through European cooperation. Acting as an enabler and facilitator for Ministries of Defence willing to engage in collaborative, capability projects, the Agency has become the ‘hub’ for European defence cooperation with expertise and networks allowing it to cover the whole spectrum.

EDA plays an important support and implementation role in all the EU defence initiatives. These tools are designed to raise the EU’s level of ambition; through the Capability Development Plan (CDP), Coordinated Annual Review on Defence (CARD), Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) and European Defence Fund (EDF).
One of the main tasks of the Agency is to support the Member States in the development of cooperative defence capability projects in the air, land, maritime, cyber or space domain.

EDA promotes and supports defence research at EU level. Based on the Overarching Strategic Research Agenda (OSRA), developed together with the Member States, the Directorate coordinates and plans joint research activities and the study of technical solutions to meet future operational needs.

EDA is responsible for the effective engagement with industry across the Agency’s activities and in support of related priorities set by Member States. EDA also supports industry access to information, business opportunities and EU tools (including funding) with special focus on SMEs.

EDA facilitates work to address the implications of EU legislation and policies for the defence sector: REACH, procurement, funding instruments and the analysis of developments influencing governmental and industrial stakeholders.

EDA initiates, develops and manages training and exercise activities for rotary and fixed-wing aircraft, including RPAS, cyber defence, counter-IEDs and energy management.

EDA helps Member States coordinate and advance work on critical enablers which support defence cooperation and enhance interoperability such as: military airworthiness, standardisation and certification, defence test & evaluation.
Work includes promotion of use of relevant EDA projects & programmes in CSDP missions and operations as well as development and management of contracted solutions to support CSDP operations in areas such as satellite communications and CIS, aero medical evacuation, management of human resources etc.