Author: Ronald Cuschier – The Malta College of Arts, Science & Technology
Overview of InnovationGUIDE Project
The InnovationGUIDE Project was a one-year project carried out in 2024. It had several work packages, which were excellently managed by Türkiye Exporters Assembly (TIM), from Türkiye, as the key partner, responsible for the project management role, among other tasks, which brought the project deliverables to success, based on five (5) other partners located in four (4) different European countries, namely Malta; Netherlands; and Spain. The four (4) partners details refer to Universiteit Maastricht (Netherlands), Fundacion Empresa-Universidad Gallega (FEUGA, Spain), Malta College of Arts Science and Technology (MCAST, Malta), Social Entrepreneurs Association Malta (SEAM, Malta) and Startup Centrum (Turkiye).
The GAT Work Package
One of the work packages, under MCAST responsibility, referred in this article is based on the Governance Analysis to promote innovation. It serves as a structured roadmap for implementing innovation in the rural economy. This article was based on primary research, where it cannot be generalised to the whole EU and/or global innovative strategies due to the research methodology adopted, namely being based on a limited sample understudy. But it will surely serve as a stepping stone for further research and also as a guided tool for all innovators to consider its relevance and explore further their strategic commitment to innovation in various operations. This article’s objective is to produce a guided approach to the identification and development of new ideas, products, and services that address local challenges and opportunities today and in the near future. One cannot exclude that innovation is a groundbreaking journey based on an intricate tapestry with a dynamic approach. The sectors understudy were varied and were based on fisheries, agriculture, sustainable tourism and bio-economy.
Project Sponsors
The project was funded by the European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA), with the objective of enabling innovators, including deep tech and social innovation startups, to take better advantage of the single market and attract new institutional investors to strengthen financial and capital markets to commercialise and scale companies in their countries.
Key terms from the Literature
An initial literature review/desk research based on a number of case studies across the globe was carried out by all five (5) partners to establish what the literature is saying about innovation. This gave insight about the importance of the Environmental Social and Governance (ESG) concept and the Circular Economy (CE) within the context of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) vis a vis the innovative commitments undertaken by various EU and global countries, since the partners considered to get a snapshot of a global perspective to be informed on what is really happening on fisheries; agriculture; hospitality; and bio-economy across the globe.
The GAT Methodology
The primary research methodology for the Governance Analysis was based on the systematic application of the Governance Assessment Tool (GAT) as a structured framework for conducting interviews. The data was collected through a series of structured interviews. Several interviews were conducted in each partner country to gather diverse perspectives on governance. The interviews targeted candidates from different stakeholder groups to ensure a comprehensive understanding of the governance landscape. The GAT framework (Bressers et al., 2013), was used to evaluate governance practices across five key dimensions:
● Levels and Scales: Various governance levels, from local to global, and their interactions.
● Actors and Networks: Involvement and collaboration among stakeholders.
● Problem Perspective and Goal Ambitions: Alignment of problem definitions and goal setting among stakeholders.
● Strategies and Instruments: Effectiveness of strategies and tools used to achieve goals.
● Responsibilities and Resources: Allocation of responsibilities and availability of resources.
The GAT assesses these dimensions based on four criteria:
● Extent: Whether all relevant elements are considered.
● Coherence: Whether elements reinforce each other.
● Flexibility: Whether the framework adapts to changes.
● Intensity: Whether elements promote changes in the status quo.
Conclusions and Recommendations
After analysing all the data based on content and thematic analysis, a set of recommendations were derived from the overall countries. Most of the recommendations were in line with all countries and the differences were very minimal from one country from another. One needs to include that there were a set of variations in the outcomes, such as in supportive elements, vis-a-vis coherence and flexibility, and also variations in restrictive and neutral elements, such as extent and intensity, depending on the country specifics. Seven (7) recommendations were extracted from the forty (40), as included in the report knowledge hub of the InnovationGUIDE portal, based on a priority filter to indicate the key milestones that promote innovation.
The recommendations derived from the GAT tool refer to all stakeholders who were involved in the innovative projects, which include entrepreneurial-based organizations, local, regional, and national-based organizations/policy makers/Government civil servants, and the EU administration, as the main sponsor and funds provisioning.
The recommendations
- 1. Entrepreneurial-based organisations need personal commitment, risk acceptance, a proactive approach, digital transformation, top-bottom and bottom-up management, knowledge, and ambition.
- 2. Policymakers support is needed throughout the project and may encourage synergies with cooperatives, Private, Academia, and civil society and encourage local investment over the international scene.
- 3. An innovative project may need to pass through a lifecycle based on three steps:
(i) Overcome all bottlenecks from different stakeholders through a level of trust; (ii) Investors/Entrepreneurs need to be persuasive and involve the ideal local policy maker to fit within the national strategies; and (iii) then the project will be in a position to scale up through lean and value-added processes in line with ESG challenges.
- 4. Civil servants’ culture is based on a reactive approach to innovation since they prefer the status quo, and training is needed to change this context to a more proactive approach.
- 5. Social communities and civil society may introduce resistance to new developments due to the impact on the environment/SDG commitment. Hence any new project needs to pass through a dedicated process to involve all stakeholders all the way to gain trust by all to promote a win-win approach.
- 6. The national and EU policies and procedures for each country need to be more flexible to adapt to SMEs innovative commitments and contextual requirements considering their demanding challenges relative the large firms.
- 7. Banks lack flexibility and hence need to facilitate/incentivise to support new investors, with the support of EU programmes for Banks to be given assurance about such new investors’ requirements.
Practical Implications
The above dimensions may be applied to practice to promote innovation through a process approach based on ten (10) activities follows:
1. Regulatory challenges and compatibility
2. Relevance and justification
3. International collaboration
4. A holistic and balanced approach to addressing regulatory and financial barriers faced by entrepreneurs and innovators, particularly in traditional sectors like agriculture and food production.
5. Coordination and outreach
6. Managing all Financial constraints
7. Flexibility and experimentation
8. Importance of community building
9. Digital platforms and community engagement
10. Responsibility of project owners
List of references and key links:
- Bressers H, de Boer C, Lordkipanidze M, Özerol G, Vinke-De Kruijf J, Furusho C, La Jeunesse I, Larrue C, Ramos MH, Kampa E, Stein U, Tröltzsch J, Vidaurre R, Browne A (2013). Water governance assessment tool. With an elaboration for drought resilience. Report to the DROP project, CSTM University of Twente, Enschede.
- https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-29671-5_3
- https://www.jagranjosh.com/general-knowledge/list-of-all-the-sustainable-development-goals-1523880206-1
Key links for InnovationGUIDE portal; Testimonials and visual demos among others relevant information: