About this event

In an era marked by interlocking crises and accelerating complexity, public and private institutions must evolve to support cross-sectoral action for sustained momentum and shared value. How do we foster radical collaboration for a resilient future, powered by shared learning and collective experience?

Working with a range of partners, the Transformative Innovation Network (ETIN) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) has developed a new Charter to provide a common reference point: a set of observations and principles to guide experimentation, evaluation, and learning across diverse contexts.

It captures the experience, insights and lessons of ETIN network members from policy, industry, finance and academia and provides a direction for the activities of the ETIN community in 2025 and beyond.

Above all, the Charter recognises the need for a systemic approach to accelerating sustainable transformations, and for multi-actor collaboration on our most urgent policy challenges.

Session details

For this short session, members of ETIN and the Transformative Innovation Policy Consortium – a core contributor to the Charter – invite participants to explore how the principles might serve as a living framework to support communities in applying transformative innovation approaches in real-world settings. These are not definitive, but intended to shape norms for how we tackle complex problems.

Through a presentation and short roundtable discussion, we’ll explore new types of collaboration across sectors, learning through action, experimentation and models for scaling. Participants will gain an understanding of the purpose behind the Charter, consider opportunities for implementation within their own context, and to share learning from this.

This session will complement the official launch of the Charter, which will take place at the 18th session of the Committee on Innovation, Competitiveness and Public-Private Partnerships in Geneva on 25 June.

Contributors

· Immanuela Badde, Associate Economic Affairs Officer, Innovative Policies Development Section, Economic Cooperation and Trade Division, UNECE

· Alejandra Boni, Professor, Universitat Politècnica de València, Spain and TRIP-Eu Hub Lead, Transformative Innovation Policy Consortium

· Kjell-Håkan Närfelt, Chief Strategy Advisor, VINNOVA, Sweden, and Chairperson for UNECE’s Team of Specialists on Innovation and Competitiveness Policies

· Victoria Shaw, Programme Director, Transformative Innovation Policy Consortium

· Lina Svensberg, Innovation Manager, Compare Foundation and the DigitalWell Arena initiative, Sweden

All very welcome globally, from the UNECE region and beyond.

UNECE has created the UN-ECE Transformative Innovation Network (ETIN), platform and meeting place for peer learning and exchanges around the challenges and opportunities in accelerating transformative innovation. Complementing other support initiatives and projects, ETIN provides a space for stakeholders from academia, research, policy, the private sector and civil society to come together in an informal setting to discuss practical examples and lessons learned in the implementation of transformative innovation. Discussions are typically based on shared national and international experiences and aim to create value in members’ efforts to promote innovative processes to increase competitiveness and accelerate a sustainable transformation of societies in the UNECE region (SDG 9).

Accelerating sustainable transformations