BSR S3 Ecosystem Platform project had the aim to influence, improve knowledge and raise discussion among regional, national and EU level innovation policy makers and experts of the opportunities, challenges and needed capacities related to the development of strategic inter-regional cooperation that would be strongly based on the regional innovation policy priorities in the Baltic Sea region – i.e. priorities of innovation strategies for smart specialisation.

The BSR S3 Ecosystem project has been underpinned by an interactive process, bringing together BSR (and wider EU) innovation actors from policy, research / science and industrial perspectives, to sharpen the focus of innovation collaboration efforts across the macro-region. Finally, recommendations and results of the BSR S3 Ecosystem project, materialized in the main ‘BSR S3 Ecosystem Advisory Hub’ as a source of strategic advice and support for the macro-region’s innovation community, which also constitute a basis for the EUSBSR PA INNO S3 agenda and actions from 2022 onwards. This Hub should facilitate the upgrading of industrial innovation collaboration opportunities across the BSR towards a stronger EU and global value chain orientation.

General recommendations of the BSR S3 Ecosystem for the longer term innovation cooperation in the Baltic Sea region are:

  1. Strong and continuous regional support, capacity building and investment is required to create sustainable foundations for joint S3 / innovation collaboration across the BSR, which can shift from a ‘project to process’ orientation.
  2. Inter-disciplinary approaches are required in order to adopt a holistic mindset relating to S3 and UN Sustainable Development Goals.
  3. The BSR is well-positioned to create new EU added value in the area of S3 interregional collaboration, given its history, capacity and experience across macro-region.
  4. The BSR requires a permanent ‘space’ (the hub) for regions and their innovation actors to converge – where they can share knowledge and co-create ideas and actions to take their plans and ambitions from a regional S3 focus to an interregional one.
  5. Facilitation the brokerage of different innovation actors across the BSR is needed (especially industrial actors) with the aim of setting out pathways for joint industrial-led, innovation investment.
  6. Adopting an S3 ecosystem approach – across the BSR – to deliver the Green Deal’s twin transitions will be essential / It is important to ensure that the Green Deal’s twin transition agenda embraces an inclusive approach, acknowledging highly differentiated needs of different groups of stakeholders and different territories across the BSR (S3 offers an holistic framework to achieve this.).

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