Начало / Университетът / Центрове / Център за икономически теории и стопански политики / Полското издание "Wszystko Co Najważniejsze" публикува статия на проф. Седларски за иновационните възможности в рамките инициативата "Три морета"

   

06.08.2021

 

 

По повод на модерираната от от проф. д-р Теодор Седларски среща на националните агенции за научни изследвания и иновации, част от 6-ата Среща на върха на регионалната инициатива „Три морета“, съпровождана от мащабен бизнес форум в София, полското издание "Wszystko Co Najważniejsze" публикува статия на проф. Седларски за иновационните и възможности в рамките инициативата.

 

Статията е разработена съвместно с проф. Албена Вуцова и г-н Мартин Дановски, председател на българската Държавна агенция за научни изследвания и иновации.

 

Пълен текст на статията на анлийски език:

 

The Three Seas is our shared chance

Teodor SEDLARSKI

 

Director of the Center for Economic Strategies and Competitiveness at the St. Clement Ohridski Sofia University, affiliated with the Institute of Strategy and Competitiveness at Harvard Business School. Co-chairman of the French-German Center for Applied Research in Economics and Management at Sofia University. Minister of Economy in the Bulgarian government (January - May 2017).

Research and innovation do play a vital role in the European Union's growth and employment strategy. They can help meet such challenges as climate change, energy security, and public health, living and working conditions. Undoubtedly this is an opportunity for the Three Seas countries - writes Prof. Teodor SEDLARSKI.

The European Commission recently adopted a communication entitled A European Strategy for International Cooperation in a Changing World, which, based on the objectives of the Lisbon Strategy, aims to establish the EU's leadership in new solutions in today's transforming world.

Research and innovation bring together various stakeholders, instruments, and policies at the local, regional and European levels. These strategies need to combine to create a coherent and beneficial development and implementation environment. A range of financial instruments should also complement them to support these strategies and their effectiveness. That requires a combination of different local and regional research and innovation ecosystems that accordingly stimulate innovation in the EU value chain. In addition, the traditional method of open cooperation can include the model of open science and open international cooperation. In such a way, we will be able to guarantee the correct answers to global problems. After all, Europe is home to around 7 percent of the world population.

Europe is a world leader in research, but its innovation development and implementation rate are low despite many proposed solutions. Europe is relatively good at increasing and maintaining the value of existing products, services, or processes in the so-called incremental innovation. However, industry leadership requires generating breakthrough innovations. That is the only way to create entirely new products, services, business models, or markets. Areas such as artificial intelligence, high-power computing centers (supercomputers and supercomputers in the network), and data economy - will allow Europe to stand out thanks to the next wave of innovation.

Differences in the development rate and the functioning of ecosystems in the EU are not helping to bring about the rapid transformation needed to face contemporary problems. There are significant differences in terms of the coherence of innovation systems. The stability of a given innovation system primarily reflects the functioning of regional innovation systems. Due to the diversified economic development of individual Member States, the differences are sometimes brutal. To minimize them, we need instruments to support regional innovation systems at various levels - both national and international. According to the European Innovation Ranking, these instruments will help develop solutions and production concepts, especially in countries considered to be small or moderate innovators. Pooling resources and implementing targeted initiatives will enable progress in this area and constructing crucial innovation ecosystems that can also function as part of the network. As a result, an appropriate environment for R&D development is to be created, in which partners will be able to develop satisfactory answers to the existing or new challenges. In this respect, joint actions can significantly increase access to knowledge, skills, and the international value chain. Thus, partners will be able to develop satisfactory answers to existing or new challenges. So, joint actions can significantly increase access to knowledge, skills, and the international value chain. Partners will be able to develop satisfactory answers to existing or new challenges accordingly. Furthermore, joint actions can significantly increase access to knowledge, skills, and the international value chain.

The Three Seas Initiative's advantages need a debate in the context of strengthening regional economies (including innovation ecosystems). 12 EU Member States (Bulgaria, Austria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia) created the Initiative as a political project. It is still not fully institutionalized and is developing as a platform for practical cooperation between the Baltic, Adriatic, and Black Sea regions. The Initiative serves as an instrument of regional cooperation and accelerated development of the region.

The economies of the Three Seas countries are EUR 1.8 trillion (in current prices) in terms of GDP (13.5% of the EU economy) and at 14.3 thousand. Euro per capita, i.e., two times less than GDP per capita in the European Union. Nevertheless, these economies are growing faster than in higher-income countries - since the creation of the Three Seas Initiative in 2019, average growth has been around 3.5%. If this indicator is maintained, the total value of the 3SI countries will increase to around 2.5 trillion euros in 2030.

However, one can see discrepancies in the innovation potential and efficiency between countries in the region - some of them lagging far behind in terms of the expected investment. A new type of cooperation is needed to counteract the slow development of production - both across Europe and in the regions with a slower pace of economic growth. Thus, the 3SI Initiative could improve the situation. Investments for the Initiative implementation should be appropriately channeled through target projects and considering the local needs.

The main assumptions of the Three Seas Initiative have accelerated economic growth of partner countries; implementation of common strategies to make the region more attractive to international financial markets; energy security and the creation of a well-connected, efficient, and competitive energy market with a choice of the supplier; digital infrastructure and providing intelligent data exchange solutions, as well as developing a more efficient use of information to reduce carbon emissions and then achieve total carbon neutrality.

The priorities are energy, transport, and digital connections, transposed in joint projects. The Three Seas Initiative needs a common strategy, better coordination, cooperation between stakeholders, and efficient cooperation to be adequately implemented. Bulgaria also added joint action in innovation, science, and education to the plan, which the other partner countries accepted positively.

Stakeholders can be various public or private structures supporting research and innovation. For example, within 3SI, the state agencies (and similar institutions) of 12 partner countries can be seen as a specific type of stakeholder in large projects in the energy, transport, or digital sectors. These structures will be complementary for providing knowledge when needed and for additional investment in blended financing. Moreover, these structures can independently assess the available innovation potential and implement a given project. The State Research and Innovation Agency is doing that in Bulgaria.

This type of stakeholder network has a chance to present the best solutions for managing large investment projects and disseminate new scientific knowledge obtained as a result of implementing target projects, thus ensuring the flow of information. The lessons learned can be passed on as they may be helpful at the project implementation stage. Various fields such as health, digital economy, resource-saving economy, energy and climate, intelligent grids, cybersecurity, pharmacy and biotechnology, artificial intelligence, nano products, tourism, agriculture, and the food industry are also areas of cooperation in which they contribute state agencies. The Sofia summit pointed out that issue.

The implementation of joint projects under Community programs and EU or trans-European initiatives can also be perceived as a field of cooperation, contributing to the development of the Three Seas Initiative. A real chance for establishing a partnership will be using supercomputer networks in selected partner countries to secure reliable and fast processing of the vast databases needed to develop common areas.

Data analysis is at the heart of many contemporary research fields - the development of artificial intelligence, climate modeling, and cryptography. Three of the eight locations as supercomputer centers are in the Czech Republic, Slovenia, and Bulgaria (all 3SI countries). The centers can connect to the high-performance pan-European computer network GÉANT. There is also the possibility of creating centers of scientific knowledge based on common areas of interest, focusing research and innovation potential, and ultimately leading to breakthroughs. After careful analysis of available resources (human, financial, and infrastructural), these centers are due to be set - with the appropriate financial instruments to go with those.

The creation of solid innovation ecosystems of individual partner countries is undoubtedly an exciting mission. They will serve as the foundation for future investment areas and target projects.

 

Teodor SEDLARSKI

In collaboration with: prof. Albena Vutsova and Martin Danovsky