Invest Sofia Took Part in a Workshop from the International Project “RRI-LEADERS: Leveraging Leadership for Responsible Research and Innovation in Territories”

 Invest Sofia took part in an expert discussion during a workshop that is part of the international project “RRI-LEADERS: Leveraging Leadership for Responsible Research and Innovation in Territories”, funded under the Horizon 2020 Programme. The discussion was hosted under the so-called world café methodology and was organized by the Sofia Development Association and the Applied Research and Communications Fund (ARC Fund) – Bulgaria – the local coordinators of the project. At the invitation of the organizers, Viktor Gusev, Head of the Investment Analysis Department at Invest Sofia, joined the discussions.

RRI-LEADERS represents a partnership of 9 organisations, of which five are methodological partners and four are territorial partners, collectively coming from 5 countries – Bulgaria, Denmark, Greece, Spain (Catalonia) and Switzerland. It examines the applicability of the principles of Responsible research and innovation in the territorial governance of four European territories – Western Macedonia in Greece, the Sofia Municipality in Bulgaria, the Municipality of Talville in Switzerland and the Municipality of Sabadell in Spain.

During the meeting, the results of a 3-month Delphi survey among over 40 experts – representatives of local authorities, academia, business, NGOs, in four areas were presented: Support for Innovation, Digital Transition, Youth Employment and Entrepreneurship, and Sustainable Urban Development. Over 190 individual responses were collected in the study and were summarized according to several criteria.

The purpose of the world café expert discussion was to gather different opinions on the assessed statements and practices related to the development of long-term policies in the Sofia Municipality and the integration of the principles of responsible research and innovation (RRI) paradigm within territorial innovation systems. In the conversation, the participants gave their ideas on which priorities and measures should be included in the transformative vision of the four policies for the long-term development of the Sofia Municipality in the next ten years. Stay tuned for more news about the project.