Considerations regarding the organisation of a national workshop in Latvia

Janis Kristapsons, Anda Adamsone-Fiskovica
Centre for Science and Technology Studies
Latvian Academy of Sciences

Issues related to the development of universities and their increasing role in the framework of the national innovation system is becoming very topical in Latvia. An increasing number of discussions are being held on the subject matter, e.g. seminar “Enhancing the competitiveness of Latvia in the European Union, technology transfer and commercialisation” organised by the Latvian Investment and Development Agency, Ministry of Economics and World Bank (8-9 June 2004); seminar “Entrepreneurship and University” organised by the University of Latvia and the British Council (9 September 2004); “Linkages between Higher Education, Research and the Business Sector” organised by the Ministry of Education and Science and the World Bank (21 June 2005), etc. On the one hand, this is a positive trend given the spreading awareness on the importance of related issues, while, on the other hand, by the time the national workshop is held there might be a certain saturation in the small local community taking part in this debate. Therefore a well though-out approach has to be taken in order to ensure attraction of the critical mass of potential (regular as well as newly attracted) participants and facilitate a productive and fresh discussion.

In the light of it we would prefer to have some rather elaborated draft material ready before holding the workshop in order to have sufficient and well-founded basis for discussion among the invited stakeholders and the national correspondents. Therefore the national workshop is intended to be organised in autumn 2006 to allow enough time for preparing the national position and identifying the key challenges and problem areas.

Since the majority of higher education and research institutions as well as state administration agencies are located in the capital of Latvia (Riga), we find it rather self-evident that the workshop should be held there as well. This, however, does not limit potential participants to those from the capital.

Preferably, a separate session could be organised in the framework of the annual international conference “Baltic Dynamics” (e.g., theme of the conference in 2004 was “Innovation and Development of Knowledge-Based Entrepreneurship”) which has been a regular initiative of the Baltic Association of Science/Technology Parks and Innovation Centres and is organized annually in turn in one of the Baltic States - Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. Unfortunately, the next conference in Latvia will be held only in the second half of 2007 since the previous one in 2004 was held in Riga.

Alternative option could be to organise this workshop as a separate section at the 8th Annual International Conference of the Banking Institution of Higher Education that should be held in autumn 2006 (e.g., theme of the 6th conference in 2004 was “Knowledge Society and Implementation of the Lisbon Strategy in Europe and Latvia”), but for the time being the main theme of the forthcoming conference and its compatibility with the intended workshop orientation is not known yet.

Another possibility is to organise this workshop as a meeting held by the Latvian Academy of Sciences (such medium scale meetings on various subjects related to science are held regularly in the premises of the Academy, e.g. “Development of science and technological research in the EU”, 15 April 2004; “Problems related to the protection of intellectual property in Latvia”, 3 February 2005). For the time being this seems to be the most realistic and practical option in terms of administrative, organisational and thematic matters.
Invited participants would cover the following organisations/institutions that so far have played a certain role in the ongoing discourse surrounding development of the national system of innovation in Latvia:
- ministries: Ministry of Education and Science, Ministry of Economics;
- universities: University of Latvia, Riga Technical University, Latvia University of Agriculture, Riga Stradins University, Daugavpils University;
- research institutes: state institute, university institute, … ;
- support organisations: Latvian Technology Centre, Innovation Relay Centre, Latvian Investment and Development Agency;
- other organisations: Council of Higher Education, Latvian Academy of Sciences;
- international agencies: World Bank, British Council, etc.

We are inclined to focus on national participants without attraction of international guests or speakers due to the corresponding problems with providing interpretation that might also inhibit a full-fledged discussion. The workshop could start with an overview of the project as a whole (presented by Anda Adamsone-Fiskovica), followed by a more extended report based on the national draft report (by Janis Kristapsons), which could be finished off by a range of questions/hypotheses for discussion (moderated by vice president of the Latvian Academy of Sciences familiar with university research problems). We might as well invite additional speakers representing the main stakeholder groups in order to make the working programme more attractive to potential participants by broadening the scope of issues/viewpoints covered. Concrete issues to be addressed should definitely include those related to currently rather tense relations between universities and university institutes, relations between universities and state institutes, etc., comparison of research output of universities and other public research, lack of interlink between research and business sector, strategies in regard to protection of intellectual property, problems related to the development of higher education and research and in the regions, etc.