On Tuesday, April 19th, 2005 Richard Stallman, founder and guru of the Free Software movement visited ARC Fund to meet with representatives from academia, private business, the Bulgarian Association for Information Technologies and other NGOs. Mr. Stallman gave a special informal talk on the four freedoms of software (i.e. run the program for any purpose, study and adapt the program, redistribute copies, improve the program and release it), the implications for education, and called for civil activism to support free software development, diffusion and usage. Read more about the Free Software...

The Guide is especially oriented to those involved in forward planning and strategy development at regional and other sub-national territorial levels (though much of the material will be equally relevant to smaller countries as well). It is aimed specifically at potential Foresight practitioners and users. It sets out to explain how regional Foresight (also known as prospective territoriale) can be implemented so as to provide valuable inputs to strategy and policy planning in regions, municipalities or localities, as well as to mobilise collective strategic actions. The Guide is produced...

Safer Internet Day was celebrated in 27 countries across Europe and beyond on 8 February 2005. The Safer Internet Day represents an effort by a global community of awareness-raising partners to promote a safer Internet for all of its users, especially young people. The days’ events are conducted under the patronage of European Commissioner Viviane Reding. Message from Commissioner Reding “As European Commissioner for Information Society and Media, the safety of children using all media is a major concern for me. I am very glad that a new Safer Internet Day is being organised in 2005...

As of November 2004 ARC Fund has been nominated as the National Information Point (NIP) for the EUREKA network in Bulgaria. EUREKA is one of the oldest and highly praised initiatives in the field of R&D and innovation at EU level, which is aimed at raising the productivity and competitiveness of European companies, industries and economies in the world market. For more than two decades EUREKA has been a label of excellence and has mobilized substantial public and private funding in support of research and development and innovation. It is an industry-driven and market-oriented network...

Country Gateways from 52 countries met in Bonn, Germany, for their first global meeting on June 24-28, 2004. The Bulgaria Country Gateway, which is operated by ARC Fund since 2001, was represented by Ms. Dinka Dinkova, ARC Fund’s Program Director and BgCG manager. The primary objectives of the global meeting were the formal launching of the Country Gateways Network and strengthening of collaboration among individual Country Gateways (CGs) through regional meetings and working sessions. During the meeting CG teams from Europe and Central Asia (ECA), Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)...

The new project QUALITYMEAT officially started in May 2004 under the FP6, priority 5th “Food Quality and Safety”. The project’s duration is 24 months and its mission is to implement a survey on the research landscape in the associated candidate countries for monitoring and promoting good quality meat production – the whole food chain from farm to fork of poultry and pork meat. The global objective of QUALITYMEAT project is to support researchers from Candidate Counties to prepare and submit projects through: screening activities research establishments active in the project’s field...