Promoting Food Innovation for Wellness in the Adriatic
WELLFOOD aims at strengthening innovation capacity of Adriatic Regions on agri-food sector, by stimulating the link between business, RTD-inn.Centers,producers-consumers as a pillar for territorial growth, development and integration of the area. Nowadays policy level is searching for holistic social innovation of communities, health and wellness implying the adoption of new governance strategies to favor health and wellbeing facing social transformation in EU Member States(MS),Candidate Countries (CC)/Potential Candidate Country (PCC). Although, great progress have been made in food sector in all above mentioned Countries, continuous increase of life expectancy, health and wellness needs of local communities, besides the same risks to which all Adriatic regions are putting trough, in terms of economic development, sustainability of public finance for health, and societal dimensions, there is a call for improvement of technology transfers to/from RTD Centers and enterprises;of innovation adoption in food processes and products, in the framework of quality&safety;of increasing consumer awareness on new findings of research about food quality and link food-health. Recognizing this common challenge, WELLFOOD places the accent on cross-border dimension promoting coordination action among stakeholders (regional bodies, RTD Centers, SMEs and Food Associations) to overcome the obstacles in the field of inn. promotion,encouraging partnership and inn. services by programming clustering policies of Innovation for Food Quality and Safety overcoming main critical factors related to development of food sector in Adriatic regions like a)weak R/D and innovation systems, hampering the possibility to update the food business sector with the most promising innovations available at a larger scale: besides obsolete technologies in the agri-food sector, Balkan-Adriatic regions suffer from inadequacy of extension services, scarce co-ordination among RTD Centers and production, low impact of institutions on the enterprises;b)difficulty to take up a sustainable develop. pattern- insufficient fulfillment of EU quality/hygienic standards and scarce confidence of consumer in food processed products. To reach the goal, WELLFOOD works on Enhancement of knowledge transfer within the Adriatic regions on food quality/safety/healthy lifestyles, reducing disparities among MS, CC,PCC through the setting of the Cross Border Network Adriatic Research Driven Cluster of Inn. for Food Quality and Safety named ADRIFOOD-Cluster which will deal with knowledge transfer, supporting a cultural movement towards new systems, products/processes within a sust. devel. frame, thanks to science-technology-business meetings(RtoR, RtoG, RtoB, BtoB),cross-border exchange initiatives and networking.Improvement of innovation capacity: spreading knowledge on last technologies/most advanced inn. food products and processes within. seminars cycles on inn. for food quality standards, inn. products, eco-processes, food inn. for diseases prevention; Mobility schemes for researchers/company technicians, aiming at giving to CC,PCC knowledge of EU-MS standards; Qualify skills and comp. of experts dealing with food inn. within RTD Centers, enterprises, public org. as Food Innovation Agents; Experiment-Piloting Technology Food Foresight schemes.Promotion of consumers’ awareness on the most promising findings of research and inn. for a healthier/safer food, to support Adriatic consumers to make sustainable choices on nutrition:WELLFOOD facilitates interdisciplinary exch. among world scientific nutritional experts, public health professionals through excellence experience study visits, small events-trail tastings of inn. creative food foresights to valorize strengths and excellences of all involved territories; promotion of innovative foods and wellbeing itineraries in the tech pj. HUB foreseen in the Food Innovation Marketing Plan is the peak of the whole action.