Science, Technology and Innovation

In the face of the Covid-19 pandemic and the increasingly palpable consequences of climate change, the fundamental role of science and its interface with technology and innovation in addressing the unprecedented challenges and upheavals facing the world was once again evident, which in turn underlines the potential of bi-regional cooperation in this thematic area to achieve a fair, inclusive, equitable and sustainable development of our societies. In this sense, STI work entails a contribution to multiple SDGs, such as SDGs 4, 9, 12, 13 and 17.

Therefore, the EU-LAC Foundation will continue, in 2022, to promote the construction of the "EU-CELAC Knowledge Area (EU-CELAC Action Plan 2015; chapter 1)" and serve as a privileged space for dialogue, connection and promotion of synergies between international, governmental and scientific actors from both regions, seeking a better articulation of the actions promoted by the EU-CELAC Joint Initiative on Research and Innovation (JIRI) and which has been concretised in the "Strategic Roadmap 2021-23", - a document agreed at the Eighth JIRI SOM at the end of October 2020.

In this regard, the Foundation will endeavour to disseminate progress and organise a workshop to encourage further exploitation of the work done in the four pillars of the JIRI: researcher mobility; cooperation in research infrastructures; global challenges - particularly health, environmental aspects of sustainable development/green transition, digital transformation; and innovation.

In the same way, the Foundation will bring together networks of young European, Latin American and Caribbean scientists pursuing a (post)doctorate related to the other region or linked to the bi-regional partnership itself, to identify common themes, offering them a specific space to include their proposals to boost scientific and academic cooperation between the two regions.

In conjunction with other partners, and depending on the specific demand articulated by stakeholders, the EU-LAC Foundation also proposes to offer training workshops for university actors on a specific topic to open avenues for greater accessibility and better use of knowledge, good practices and ongoing initiatives in bi-regional scientific cooperation.

Seminar "2nd Latin American and Caribbean Days" in Ljubljana (May 2019)