UNDP to complete the project «Developing an Infrastructure to Support Innovation»

Economic growth, poverty reduction and sustainable development are the priority focuses of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in Belarus. One of the efficient ways of addressing problems in these areas is to improve access to alternative income-generation sources through simplification of entry procedures for small and medium businesses. This implies continued efforts aimed at establishment and improvement of the infrastructure for innovation activity. Its development is a trigger for sustainable economic growth, technological development, successful restructuring and mitigation of social and economic hardships of transition as it improves small and medium businesses’ access to new and high technologies and funding.

On 20 December the conference hall of the Republican Center for Technologies Transfer hosted the press-conference devoted to completion of the joint project of the Government Of Belarus, the UNDP and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) «Developing an Infrastructure to Support Innovation Activity in the Republic of Belarus». The project has proved to be a successful example of achieving good results within limited resources due to consolidation of efforts of the Government of Belarus, UNDP and UNIDO. One of the project outputs is the establishment of the Republican Center for Technologies Transfer (RCTT), its four regional departments and two branch offices that form a single network based on the informational and communication technologies. The RCTT resident office in Moscow was set up jointly with the company «F&D» (Moscow); collaboration with the Shanghai International Center for Technologies Transfer “Co-Way Ltd” has allowed to establish the RCTT office in Shanghai (China). On top of that, the RCTT web-site was created. It contains the databases intended to provide services to the clients of the technological transfer through Internet. During 19 months the site has been visited by almost 50 thousand clients. RCTT signed over 60 contracts with clients and 18 contracts in the field of technologies transfer with companies from Great Britain, Germany, China, South Korea, Poland, Russia and Kazakhstan. Within the framework of the project over 600 Belarusian specialists were trained in various aspects of innovation activity at 38 national and international workshops, conferences and fairs. Among the clients of the Republican Center for Technologies Transfer are the Belarusian Academy of Sciences, the Belarusian State University, 19 small innovation companies and others. The projects of RCTT, its regional departments and branch offices have been awarded with 6 medals at the international fairs. Four innovation companies from Belarus and one Belarus-Russia joint venture use the design from the RCTT database. The Center is engaged in implementation of one government project and one government program.

Alessandro Fracassetti,  Assistant Resident Representative, said that «in accordance with the concepts and the statutory documents of RCTT and its offices, the focal activities are, financially, of non-profit, input-demanding kind, therefore, the newly established infrastructure can hardly gain financial stability now. Being aware of the situation, UNDP will readily extend its collaboration with the Government of Belarus and UNIDO, by focusing primarily on facilitating SMEs’ access to new and high technologies».