Commission Regulation (EU) No 557/2013Show full title

Article 4 Research entities

1. Recognition of research entities shall be based on criteria referring to:

(a) the purpose of the entity; the assessment of the purpose of the entity shall be carried out on the basis of its statute, mission or other declaration of purpose; the purpose of the entity shall include reference to research;

(b) the established record or reputation of the entity as a body producing quality research and making it publicly available; the experience of the entity in carrying out research projects shall be assessed on the basis of, inter alia, available lists of publications and research projects in which the entity was involved;

(c) the internal organisational arrangements for research; the research entity shall be a separate organisation with legal personality, focused on research or a research department within an organisation; the research entity must be independent, autonomous in formulating scientific conclusions and separated from policy areas of the body it belongs to;

(d) the safeguards in place to assure security of the data; the research entity shall fulfil technical and infrastructure requirements assuring security of the data.

2. A confidentiality undertaking covering all researchers of the entity who will have access to the confidential data for scientific purposes and specifying the conditions for access, the obligations of the researchers, the measures for respecting the confidentiality of statistical data and the sanctions in the event of a breach of these obligations shall be signed by a duly designated representative of the research entity.

3. The Commission (Eurostat) shall, in cooperation with the ESS Committee, establish guidelines for the assessment of research entities, including the confidentiality undertaking referred to in Article 4(2). When duly justified, the Commission (Eurostat) shall update the guidelines, in accordance with procedural arrangements approved by the ESS Committee.

4. Reports on the assessments of research entities shall be made available to the national statistical authorities.

5. The Commission (Eurostat) shall maintain and publish on its website an updated list of recognised research entities.

6. The Commission (Eurostat) shall perform regular re-assessments of the research entities included in the list.