Hotel Habakuk in Maribor hosted the KEN 2012 Annual Forum about ‘Developing Knowledge Economy through Partnerships’ on 11 – 12 June. The Annual Forum brought together participants from different countries. Dr. Boris Cizelj, Chairman of Knowledge Economy Network and Mr. Tomaž Kancler, Deputy Major of the City Maribor, gave the opening speech and welcomed all the participants.
Mr. Mehmet Gokgoz presented his organization TURBO and stressed the importance of the collaboration between public and private partnership.
The speech was followed by the thematic discussion including topics as Inter-Generational Dialogue and Partnership, Support Systems for Innovation and Entrepreneurship Benefits of Gender Balance in Corporate Decision-making and Building Skills for Knowledge Economy through Implementation of University Reforms.
KEN Forum 2012
The awards ceremony took place in the evening. Ambassador of Japan H. E. Mr Toshimitsu Ishigure was awarded for successful reform of tertiary education system and Ambassador of the Republic of Turkey H. E. Mr Derya Kanbay for the contribution of public and private R&D funding to the economic growth. Also, KEN Award for media and NGOs was given to BBC. European Affairs Fund, AP Vojvodina (Serbia), Knowledge Mobilisation Unit – York University (Canada), SEECEL – South East European Centre for Entrepreneurial Learning (Croatia) took the award of the best practises.
The KEN 2012 resolution paper states the following:
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Knowledge economy policies need to be cohesive and well coordinated
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Active and engaged citizens, civil society, competent and responsible leaders are necessary to inclusive and sustainable development
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Modern education must enable young people for creative thinking and not just to memorize facts and information. Both curricula and methods of teaching should be modernized.
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Business – Academia partnership is absolutely essential to knowledge economy and to innovative entrepreneurship.
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Gender balance in corporate decision making is another important issue, voluntary or mandatory quotas for female representation are necessary.
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SMEs are not important only in terms of securing employment but also as a source of innovation.
KEN Forum 2012