ERA-NET
First ERA-MBT Stakeholder meeting report is online!
The first Stakeholder meeting of the Marine Biotechnology ERA-NET (ERA-MBT), held in Lisbon, Portugal, on the 28th and 29th October of 2014, gave participants an opportunity to influence the future of the ERA-MBT and to reinforce the network of researchers, industry, policy makers and funding agencies to support the development of European marine biotechnology. This successful stakeholder meeting which was hosted by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) attracted 100 participants from a mix of industry, funding agencies, policy makers/advisors and research delegates. Interactive sessions gave a chance to participants to provide feedback on opportunities and challenges for ERA-MBT to stimulate marine biotechnology research and innovation. The event comprised 3 sessions: I) State of the Art of Marine Biotechnology; II) Where do we go? and III) Next steps of Marine Biotechnology ERA-NET.
The report outlines extensive stakeholder feedback. High on the list are issues associated with:
- Sampling marine material and sampling protocols;
- The challenge of upscaling from discovery to commercial exploitation;
- A need for new financial instruments to stimulate enhanced research-industry and industry-industry collaboration;
- Using future calls to focus efforts towards elements in the value chain.
- Creating greater visibility of marine biotechnology;
- Providing methods that stimulate more young researchers to engage in marine biotechnology.
Overall, the stakeholder event was considered as highly successful in addressing strategic issues that will be taken into account for further developing ERA-MBT and providing participants with the opportunity to expand their research and other collaborative networks.
We would like to thank all participants for their valuable contributions to this succesful ERA-MBT event.
Please note that pdf files of the presentations are given at the ERA-MBT web page www.marinebiotech.eu/stakeholder-meeting.