From October 8 to 10th, the first mutual learning event of the FORWARD project took place in Brussels at the Canary Island Brussels Office, gathering 22 representative of the members of the project consortium from 8 European outermost regions (OR).
Organized under the workpackage 2 dedicated to the diagnostic of OR’s R&I ecosystems and participation in FP, this event aimed at sharing knowledge and experiences among OR on the major obstacles and levers that influence their participation in FP, and at drafting a common vision and roadmap for a joint strategy to increase the participation of ORs in Framework programmes.
The mutual learning event began with a presentation of the main results of a comparative analysis which was built on the diagnoses performed by each region according to a common methodology, designed as a replicable approach to assess regional participation in FP and analyse the main determinants identified by the literature (quality of the European networks, performance of the regional innovation system, R&I organizations characteristics and policies, individual determinants). Such analysis based on the data provided by partners and European sources (CORDIS and Eurostat) proposed a state of play of the participation of the outermost regions in FP, a comparison with other regions that share close characteristics and an analysis of the main determinants that influence the participation
The results of the mutual learning event will feed the final diagnosis of OR performance and the FORWARD joint strategy. These two documents will fit into the deliverable 2.2 which will be submitted in December 2019.
The First Day of the kick-off meeting was mainly dedicated to the presentation of the project partner institutions, the different work packages and to inform the consortium about the Grant and the Consortium Agreements and the Financial Management.
The Second Day was marked by the telematic greetings from the European Commission represented by Stefan Weirs the Project Officer. Later in the morning, Consulta Europa presented the Internal project management and reporting principles. Michelle Perello presented the management structure of the project, the monitoring plan and eligible costs… and participants agreed with next steps and deadlines for the consortium. The second day was closed with a workshop facilitated by NEXA to prepare the work that will be undertaken in WP2
