The international competitiveness of modern economies is linked increasingly to their ability to generate, adapt and use new knowledge. Science and technology (S&T) are considered to be key factors contributing to achieving sustainable development, prosperity and economic growth. S&T has also proved to be instrumental to enhancing and enriching many other policy areas with an impact on external relations: trade, development, environment, energy, telecommunications, etc.
A new approach is followed in the 7th Framework Programme to support the activities of international cooperation:

• The theme-oriented international cooperation actions are carried out under the Cooperation programme;
• The international actions in the area of human potential are carried out under the People programme;
• Activities of the Capacities Programme are designed to support and stimulate the participation of third countries in the Framework Programme as well as provide access opportunities in research programmes managed by third countries.

The latter foster international cooperation through support measures for third countries and regions. They support dialogues and information exchange activities with third countries and regions in order to enable the EU and the targeted countries and regions to discuss with different current and future research priorities. The outcomes of these dialogues provide intelligence for developing research policy, offer input to the respective FP7 Specific Programmes, and inspire research topics for international cooperation, in particular in the Cooperation Programme. The activities of international cooperation in the Capacities Programme also support actions to increase coherence in international research activities with and amongst the Member States that contribute to a better Europe-level coordination on aspects of international S&T cooperation, as well as to improve knowledge on the cooperation opportunities offered by third countries' research programmes.
The activities defined in the Specific Programme are:

• Bi-regional coordination of S&T cooperation including priority setting and definition of S&T cooperation policies (INCO-NET);
• Bilateral coordination for the enhancement and development of S&T Partnerships (BILAT);
• Supporting the coordination of national and regional policies and activities of Member States and Associated States on international S&T cooperation (ERA-NET).
• Supporting the trans-national activities of International Cooperation NCPs (INCO-NCP)
• Supporting EU access to third country programmes (ACCESS4EU)

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• Capacities Programme (CORDIS)