Activities will also include research and innovation on design, advanced processes, pilot lines for fabrication, related production technologies and demonstration actions to validate technology developments and innovative business models as well as underlying next generation technologies exploiting advances in quantum physics.

50. Notes that, although there are increasing numbers of women using computers and surfing the internet in an elementary way, the digital divide in terms of skills remains very wide, restricting women's access to and use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), thus hampering their ability to seek and find skilled work and, consequently, intensifying inequalities within households, communities, labour markets and the wider economy; calls, therefore, for efforts to promote women's access to the use of new technologies by ...[+++]giving them priority access to free training courses; invites the Member States and the regions to set up free computer training courses through projects financed by the European Social Fund (ESF), providing women with the chance to acquire new technical skills in the fields of technology and computer science and leading to greater opportunities for female employment in the service sector; calls on governments to implement policies (such as promotion campaigns and specific scholarships) aimed at increasing the level of enrolment of female students in information and communications technology courses;

50. Notes that, although there are increasing numbers of women using computers and surfing the internet in an elementary way, the digital divide in terms of skills remains very wide, restricting women’s access to and use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), thus hampering their ability to seek and find skilled work and, consequently, intensifying inequalities within households, communities, labour markets and the wider economy; calls, therefore, for efforts to promote women’s access to the use of new technologies by ...[+++]giving them priority access to free training courses; invites the Member States and the regions to set up free computer training courses through projects financed by the European Social Fund (ESF), providing women with the chance to acquire new technical skills in the fields of technology and computer science and leading to greater opportunities for female employment in the service sector; calls on governments to implement policies (such as promotion campaigns and specific scholarships) aimed at increasing the level of enrolment of female students in information and communications technology courses;

60. Calls on the Council and the Commission to ensure, through the EU-China Energy and Environment Programme and other channels, that collaboration on renewable energy/energy efficiency issues will be a priority for future EU-China co-operation, and to encourage China's development of sustainable technologies and industries, particularly to enable cooperation in developing new technologies that will make a sustainable future possible; calls on China, when building new coal-fired power stations, to use the latest, most efficient and most environmentally-friendly technologies, and as soon as possible to use so-called clean coal technologi ...[+++]es in the construction of such power stations; further calls on China to improve safety standards in its coal mines; calls on the Commission to offer the cooperation of European mining technology companies; calls on China, in the event of the possible building of new nuclear power stations, to make use of European experience and safety technology and to cooperate closely with European manufacturers and authorities such as the International Atomic Energy Agency;

57. Calls on the Council and the Commission to ensure, through the EU-China Energy and Environment Programme and other channels, that collaboration on renewable energy/energy efficiency issues will be a priority for future EU-China co-operation, and to encourage China’s development of sustainable technologies and industries, particularly to enable cooperation in developing new technologies that will make a sustainable future possible; calls on China, when building new coal-fired power stations, to use the latest, most efficient and most environmentally-friendly technologies, and as soon as possible to use so-called clean coal technologi ...[+++]es in the construction of such power stations; further calls on China to improve safety standards in its coal mines; calls on the Commission to offer the cooperation of European mining technology manufacturers; calls on China, in the event of the possible building of new nuclear power stations, to make use of European experience and safety technology and to cooperate closely with European manufacturers and authorities such as the International Atomic Energy Authority;

Amongst the numerous obstacles preventing them from adopting the new information technologies, attention should be drawn to national regulations which are often unsuitable, non-harmonised standards and technologies, a serious lack of staff (in SMEs) with sufficient skills and, finally, the fact that access to new information and communication technologies is often too costly for SMEs.