Between 12 and 13 February 2013, ARC Fund’s team took part in a consortium meeting of the ‘Complex Challenges – Innovative Cities’ project in Warsaw, Poland, followed by a thematic workshop on using public procurement for innovation in the public sector.
During the first day of the event, Ventseslav Kozarev and Blagovesta Chonkova presented the initial findings from the analysis of the completed online state-of-the-art questionnaire, filled in by more than 800 respondents from 10 EU countries, as well as the nearly 100 semi-structured stakeholder interviews, carried out by each partner. These findings are part of a State-of-the-art Report on Public Sector Innovation, which is one of the key results of the project, and whose primary objectives are: to improve the understanding of public sector innovation; to inquire into the role of innovation for improving the efficiency of local/regional policy-making; and to generate recommendations on strengthening innovation capacity in the public sector through focused planning, transfer of good practices, and innovation policy diffusion. The rest of the first day focused on organisational issues to ensure the smooth flow of the implementation of the project.
The second day of the consortium meeting was dedicated to discussing various policy aspects of public procurement. Keynote speakers during the event were a representative of the European Parliament, discussing the progress of the new proposed EU Directive on public procurement, as well as Mr. Jacek Łęgiewicz, Vice-president of the Polish Chamber of Information Technology and Telecommunications, elaborating on the implementation of the Polish legislation in the field of public procurement.
The rest of the day was devoted to sharing good practices by the municipalities and regional authorities, which are partners in the project. The presentations of the partners were followed by lively discussions on the benefits, limits and transferability of the shared good practices. Beside the concrete examples presented by the partners, some of the issues discussed during this session included: the importance of close involvement of stakeholders throughout the innovation cycle to ensure the effective and successful design and implementation of innovation, the need for transparency and dialogue among the different parties involved, as well as the political support, which seems to be among the most important factors for the success of an innovation.
The CCIC project brings together partners – mostly municipal and regional authorities – from 10 EU countries, and aims at stimulating the leading role of municipal and regional authorities in supporting and generating innovation in the public sector. It was made possible by the INTERREG IVC Programme and is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund.
ARC Fund’s key responsibility in CCIC is to design the overall methodological framework of the project, used by the partners to explore the innovation potential in the public sector. Thus, ARC Fund prepared a number of instruments that partners can use to scope through their local environment and identify practices, stakeholders and opinions about the opportunities and hurdles of public sector innovation.
