Jan-Olof Lind is Director General of the Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI) and Chairman of the European Defence Agency's Research & Technology Steering Board. In this short interview here below, Mr Lind reflects on the importance of innovation on defence, critical defence technologies and his expectations regarding EDA's upcoming R&T conference in December.
EDA's R&T conference will look at the issue of innovation in and for defence. How important is innovation in defence and what is the state of innovation in Europe?
Innovation is a key driver for capability building in defence and beyond. We may not normally talk about innovation in defence technology programming, but it aptly describes what we do; generating new knowledge, as well as practising existing knowledge and technology to new purposes and in novel ways. The defence world is very used to program and fund long-term knowledge generation activities against targeted capability goals. In the civilian world, the capability focus is perhaps not always that articulated but that does not mean that our innovation and knowledge generation is not of use for the civilian world, perhaps in particular for security purposes. My own research agency works, for instance, for front-line services (police, fire and rescue services), health and welfare services, etc. To a greater extent we have to be able to benefit from innovation and development in the civilian R&T sphere. The EDA could play an important role in assisting Member States in this respect.
EDA developed a first list of critical defence technologies. How does this work relate to national approach in Member States?
The list developed by the Agency is a good first step and we need to continue to discuss and agree on a version that we can start working on. Member States together with the Agency need to constantly review such lists in order to make sure that they are up to date and targeted towards the challenges currently at hand. The need to analyse technology dependencies is, for some nations, a relatively new approach to research and technology orientation. There is great potential for exchange of lessons learned and establishing good practices. The Agency could play a vital role here. What can participants expect from the conference?
The conference focuses on two vital aspects of the current challenges in research and technology - the dependencies we face and the need to employ innovation for defence purposes, across the board, from both military and civilian research. I hope that the participants will find new thoughts and ideas from the podium that they can bring home and perhaps start employing or at least starting a national discussion. But, perhaps equally important, are the not so tangible benefits that discussions with similarly minded people can bring, together with exchange thoughts and experiences in the margins of the conference, over a coffee during the break.
Picture: Jan-Olof Lind © FOI
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