PDF Basket
The institute’s drive to advance the bioeconomy takes the shape of a five-year project named BioEcon, which began with the creation of a dedicated research department and the recruitment of a renowned scientist to head it up. The project’s overall objective is to boost and unlock the institute’s research potential in support of Poland’s wider strategy for smart specialisation, which encompasses the bioeconomy as one of several priorities.
More specifically, the project team intends to foster research excellence in the sector by means of recruitment, training and international cooperation, and boost the organisational and managerial processes relevant to this research.
Other aims include mobilising regional support through interaction with policymakers and stakeholders, promoting technology transfer to ensure that research results are put to good use, and stimulating regional development in cooperation with economic partners. Further work will focus on the research and innovation strategy itself.
BioEcon was launched in July 2015 with financial support from the EU’s ERA Chairs initiative. This scheme enables universities and research institutions to recruit outstanding academics that will help them to reach new heights in a particular area of research.
It’s an investment designed to close the research and innovation divide in Europe and encourage participation in the European Research Area (ERA). Institutions that have built up top-flight research capacity are in a better position to compete for funding and contribute to knowledge creation and innovation at European level – an advantage that is also expected to help them maintain their teams beyond the end of the project.