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Flemish Advisory Council for Innovation and Entrepeneurship

VARIO gives advise to the Flemish Government and the Flemish Parliament on its science, innovation and entrepreneurship policy.

Report in the spotlight

VARIO report: The leaky pipeline at work: women severely underrepresented as inventors in patents

  • Among Flemish inventors in Flemish patents, only 1 in 5 is a woman. The proportion of Flemish female inventors in Flemish EPO patent applications did increase from 0.14 in 2001 to 0.2 in 2017.
  • For company patents from Flanders, only 1 inventor in 6 is a woman. For patents from Flemish Higher Education, 1 in 3.4 inventors is female.

Presentation VARIO Memorandum on the 14th of December

VARIO currently works on a Memorandum for future policymakers in the Flemish Parliament and the Flemish Government in the context of the 2024 Flemish elections. What should the policy framework for innovation look like? What choices should we stick to? What new trends are coming our way?

The trajectory for the Memorandum officially started in July, with a 'scenario thinking' workshop. The resulting report will help inspire our recommendations.

The Memorandum will be officially presented at the VARIO colloquium on Thursday 14th of December 2023 from 15h onwards, in 'De Schelp' - Flemish Parliament.

Request for advice: Proposal from the European Commission for a regulation on plants obtained by certain new genomic techniques and their food and feed

VARIO was asked by the minister of Economy, Innovation and Agriculture, Jo Brouns, to advise on the European Commission's proposal of 5 July 2023 for a regulation on plants modified with certain new genenomic techniques (NGT), and food and feed produced from them. The advisory report is expected by the end of September.

More specifically, the minister expects a response to VARIO's reading of the European Commission's 5 July 2023 proposal and the views of the council and its stakeholders regarding the European Commission's proposal.

Other recent reports

View all advices

Advisory report 29: In­du­stri­al Energy and Climate Tran­si­ti­on program - Program note

29 March 2023
VARIO supports the 'climate leap' and formulates recommendations to strengthen the transition program

Expert report In­du­stri­al Internet of Things (IIoT) in the context of IPCEI

26 September 2022
In the context of its advice on IPCEI - Important Projects of Common European Intrest - VARIO commissioned expert reports on four strategic…

Advisory report 28: Foreign private in­vest­ment in R&D and knowledge-intensive pro­duc­ti­on

23 August 2022
Perpetuating and strengthening foreign knowledge-intensive investments