1st stakeholder group meeting in Centru Region, Romania

Hosted by the University ”Lucian Blaga” of Sibiu, the meeting gathered around the table the representatives of universities, research institutes, public authorities and companies active in the agri-food sector.

The aim of this meeting was to identify and discuss the needs of the active stakeholders in the regional agri-food sector and the funding opportunities available under the Centru Region Programme 2021-2027, Priority 1 A competitive region through innovation, digitalisation and dynamic businesses, Action 1.1: Development of RDI and TT structures for the benefit of enterprises – the policy instrument addressed by the ORIGINN project.   

The first part of the meeting was focused on introducing the key information about the ORIGINN project and the related policy instrument. During the second part of the meeting, the stakeholders took part in the EDP exercise allowing them to identify and share the main challenges when it comes to find the appropriate sources of funding, on one hand, and to implement the projects that include at least one research component, on the other hand. Based on the previous experience of the participants and taking into account the financing opportunities available within the Centru Region Programme 2021-2027 and the upcoming calls for proposals dedicated to the financing of RDI structures and technology transfer, each participant presented 2-3 possible challenges and bottlenecks that could be prevented by improving the financing instrument tailored for the development of regional RDI infrastructure.