In the period from October 28. to November 04. 2020. Innovation and entrepreneurship center Tehnopolis, in cooperation with the Ministry of Economy of Montenegro, organized three workshops as part of the activities to establish a Community of practice in Montenegro, involving all stakeholders, aiming to develop innovative solutions within agricultural sector.
The workshops aimed to map the innovation needs of the companies and agricultural producers in the field of food production, the protection of natural resources during the production cycle, as well as mapping innovations needs in order to mitigate the effects of climate changes, from the aspect of agriculture. Also, another aim of the workshops was to analyze the identified needs with researchers, startup companies and innovators from the mentioned areas, all in order to identify potential solutions and improve their businesses.
Within the first workshop, whose topic was Production of quality and healthy food for all by reducing the environmental and climatic pressure, participants actively participated in the discussion and identified the needs for innovation, which could significantly contribute to solving the problems they are facing with in the processes of producing quality and healthy food. The topic of the second workshop was Protection of resources that enter the production process (water, soil, etc.) where participants worked on mapping the problems and potential solutions they face when it comes to protecting natural resources, specifically land and water in agriculture, as well as finding adequate solutions for their sustainable management. The topic of the third workshop was Guarantee environmental services, including mitigation of the effects of climate change, with more sustainable production processes, where participants worked on mapping potential solutions when it comes to reducing the negative impact of agriculture on the environment.
In the next two months, Innovation and entrepreneurship center Tehnopolis will provide incubation support for all those ideas that have been recognized by the participants to have the potential to develop into sustainable business initiatives.
The workshops were moderated by Mr. Nikica Marinkovic, degree engineer in Agriculture – Agri management. He has experience in various projects – agriculture, local economic development and in IT sector and works on development projects in mountainous Balkans regions in UN (FAO) Food and agriculture organization.
During the workshops, also was presented the support which IEC Tehnopolis provides for the development of innovations in the field of agriculture, through various segments of work, such as BioLab Tehnopolis, TechLab Tehnopolis, or FILA Innovation Laboratory, to conduct numerous educational activities, aiming to adopt innovations and modern technologies acceptable in the agricultural sector. These activities will provide companies (especially SMEs ) with access to research results, thus stimulating the creation of innovative solutions in the agro-industry at the international level, as well as further investment in innovation, support to the start-up community, etc.
The workshops were organized within the project “Strengthening and empowering of cross border innovation networks through Fertilization Innovation Labs in Agro-food for improving the connection between research and SMEs (EIP approach)” – FILA. The lead partner of the project is the International Centre for Advanced Mediterranean Agronomic Studies – Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Bari (IT), and the project partners are Regional Development Agency 3 (Korçë-Elbasan-Berat) (AL), Albanian Investment Development Agency – AIDA (AL), Innovation and entrepreneurship center Tehnopolis and the Ministry of Economy of Montenegro. The project is funded by the EU through the Interreg IPA CBC Italy-Albania-Montenegro programme.
