Targeted meetings between institutions from Greece and Israel for proposal submissions to European Green Deal

A transnational networking event for the European Green Deal between companies and research teams from Greece and Israel was held on Tuesday 13 October 2020 by the General Secretariat for Research and Technology, with the support of the National Documentation Centre (EKT) and the PRAXI Network, National Contact Points for Horizon 2020 in Greece. The event was organised in collaboration with Israel Innovation Authority, National Contact Point for Horizon 2020 in Israel, and Enterprise Europe Network.

The aim was to support bodies from Greece and Israel in the development of partnerships and consortia for the submission of proposals within the framework of the European Commission's 'European Green Deal'. The event was attended by representatives of private companies, universities, research centres, and other organisations active in the thematic areas of the European Green Deal with an interest in its potential use.

The above event involved 51 brokerage meetings of which 48 were transnational, while 3 meetings were held with organisations from the same country. These meetings were attended by 53 representatives from 46 different bodies, covering all stakeholders: private companies, academic and research organisations, the public sector and other organisations. Of the 53 participants, 28 were from Greece and  25 from Israel, while in terms of categorisation, 23 represented private companies, 12 research organisations, 11 academic organisations, and 7 other bodies and organisations.

There were participants interested in all the  European Green Deal themes, with the theme 'Industry for a clean and circular economy' attracting the most interest among the participants (30), followed by the themes 'Farm to fork' and 'Increasing climate ambition' (27 and 24 respectively), with the least interest being shown for the theme 'Energy and resource efficient buildings' (13).

The above event is expected to create a satisfactory basis for co-operation between stakeholders from the two countries with the aim of submitting proposals for funding through the European Green Deal. The European Commission opened the 'Green Deal call', with a budget of 1 billion euros, on September 17, 2020 and will accept proposals until January 26, 2021. It is part of the Horizon 2020 Programme and is expected to make a decisive contribution to the implementation of the objectives of the European Green Agreement. The main objectives of the call are to address the problems caused by climate change and to find solutions for a just and sustainable social transformation.

Integrated services from EKT

EKT operates as  National Contact Point for the European programme Horizon 2020 for research and innovation, providing the Greek research community with a series of integrated services for  the submission of proposals and participation in the programme. Enterprise Europe Network-Hellas, the Greek hub of Enterprise Europe Network, is the largest Greek business support network, consisting of industrial associations, research and technology institutes, chambers of commerce and industry and renowned bodies in the field of innovation and small and medium enterprises .

As co-ordinator of the Enterprise Europe Network-Hellas, EKT supports innovative and outward-oriented Greek companies to gain access to new markets and financing and exploiting their research results and technologies / products. It provides personalised services for innovation management and business scaling up, informs about European policies, provides information on the operation of the European market and the financial opportunities that exist in it. It also gives small and medium-sized enterprises the opportunity to participate in consultations on future initiatives. These services cover international business, technology and research collaborations, knowledge exchange and technology transfer, participation in business missions and brokerage events.