Work program 2026

In January, VARIO received a request for advice from minister-president Diependaele regarding the draft of the Fifth Flemish Strategy for Sustainable Development (VSDO5). VARIO decided to join SERV, Minaraad, SALV and SARC in responding to this request with a joint advisory report.

The councils call for strengthening the sustainability policy, including within mainstream policy domains. This is necessary to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), to orient policy toward the long term, to better seize the opportunities of sustainability, and to avoid the risks associated with non‑sustainable practices. The councils support the choice for a mission-oriented approach, but raise questions about, among other things, the selection of the missions, their connection to the SDGs, and their support in the field. In a separate section, where the advisory councils highlight their own priorities, VARIO emphasizes that sustainable must also mean financially sustainable. Focusing on (non-economic aspects of) sustainability should not come at the expense of our economic competitiveness.

In the Flemish coalition agreement 2024–2029, reference is made to directing support toward strategic sectors “with strong future potential and added value”. Within the framework of the Flemish Acceleration, and at the request of Flemish minister-president Matthias Diependaele, VARIO worked on a decision-making framework for strategic choices. In doing so, VARIO was able to rely on studies by ECOOM and commissioned two additional studies of its own.

VARIO aims to investigate how the R&D&I system can deliver more output. Despite investing 3.5% of GDP in R&D, Flanders faces valorisation challenges within its knowledge‑intensive ecosystem. To streamline the use of (public) financial R&D&I resources and instruments in order to increase productivity growth, bottlenecks along the innovation chain must be avoided. This relates to the systemic distribution of financial resources and instruments, but also to the associated modalities.

VARIO is preparing a background report featuring a TRL‑based analysis of government support for R&D, as well as an analysis of growth drivers in development projects. In addition, in an external study an international benchmarking exercise on the commercial potential of Flemish research will be conducted.

Taking into account the rapid acceleration in Artificial Intelligence (AI) since 2023, VARIO is proactively developing an advisory trajectory on Flemish AI policy. To achieve the desired policy objectives, two complementary policy approaches can be pursued: (1) a supply‑side approach based on substantial investments in groundbreaking R&D for cutting‑edge AI technology, AI infrastructure, and AI training programs, and (2) a demand‑side approach to AI, focused on supporting industrial AI applications and needs based on societal objectives.

Furthermore, AI as a system technology is linked to macroeconomic productivity growth (in the GRP), making this advisory trajectory also an application of VARIO Advisory Report 39 on creative destruction (2025), as well as connecting it to the Flemish Government’s Competitiveness and Productivity Agenda. However, AI’s impact on productivity growth is not automatic and requires economic policy and institutional innovation (at Flemish, Belgian, and European level). Recently, for instance, the IMF emphasized that AI could raise European productivity, but only in combination with institutional reforms (e.g. deepening the internal market, strengthening financial markets, labour mobility, flexible regulation…).

In light of this, VARIO focuses on the question how Flanders, as a small innovative region, could strengthen its position and strategically differentiate itself in the global AI race. This requires finding a balance between harnessing the societal benefits and productivity gains of AI on the one hand, and addressing risks or disruptive aspects for our society on the other hand (cf. AI Fair Tech).

Many low‑ and middle‑income countries are characterised by enormous dynamism and potential. In fast-growing countries across Africa, South America and Southeast Asia, there are great opportunities for economy, innovation and entrepreneurship. VARIO will focus on Africa, a continent that still receives too little attention, yet has the youngest and fastest‑growing population and the greatest social needs. By focusing more on cooperation with fast-growing countries through innovation, we can reinforce both these regions and our own. VARIO aims to elaborate in the advisory report how this can be done concretely.

In its memorandum, among others, the council already referred to Finnish “Developing Markets Platform” as an example. On the one hand, this is about solving global challenges through innovation; and on the other hand, about giving Finnish companies access to international growth markets in times of limited growth of their own market. Here, R&D funding is complemented by resources for development cooperation.

For this advisory trajectory, VARIO also looks at the Impact Licensing Initiative. Social impact licensing is a time‑bound permission granted by a technology holder to bring an IP, a technology, a product or a service to a predetermined market on preferential terms for the creation of social value. Here, the win-win collaboration happens through economic valorisation and (frugal) innovation.

For this advisory trajectory, both entrepreneurship and academic exchange and knowledge transfer are relevant, because they are inextricably linked.

In the trajectory on strategic choices, the availability of the necessary talent emerges as one of the factors that will determine whether a strategic choice is ‘feasible’ or not. In a separate trajectory, VARIO now aims to further elaborate on how this factor can be strengthened. How can we, for example, improve lifelong learning, essential for keeping knowledge and skills up to date in a rapidly changing world? And how can we provide our STEM talent with more entrepreneurial skills?

VARIO organises a study tour every year. The purpose of such visits is to draw lessons for Flanders from other innovation systems. What can we take away as inspiration for Flemish STI policy? The destinations of these visits alternate between places inside and outside Europe.

The 2025 study tour was postponed to early January 2026. VARIO travelled with a group of external stakeholders to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), where they visited universities, companies, investors, government institutions, and more. VARIO is planning a European study tour in the second half of 2026.

The annual VARIO colloquium will take place in the afternoon of Thursday, 26 November 2026, in the Marie-Elisabeth Belpaire building in Brussels.

In the run‑up to its tenth anniversary in 2027, VARIO will conduct an evaluation of the period 2022–2026. A first evaluation covering the period 2017–2021 was carried out in 2022. This new evaluation is undertaken on VARIO’s own initiative and will be conducted by an independent, external committee. This critical reflection helps the council to optimise its operations and impact.