Europe’s research and innovation (R&I) system is facing new challenges as demographic trends reshape societies, economies, and labour markets. With ageing populations, shifting migration patterns, and evolving skill demands, it is crucial to anticipate how these transformations will impact education, research careers, innovation ecosystems, and funding landscapes.
This commissioned study for DG RTD under the FOD2 FWC seeks to develop scenarios until 2050, and to understand the implications of demographic change on the R&I system. By exploring weak signals, trends and interactions—including the role of emerging technologies such as AI—we aim to identify strategic policy options to support a competitive, sustainable, and fair Europe. The study will provide insights to help policymakers and stakeholders design resilient R&I policies that respond to demographic shifts.

Supports the economic growth in South-East Europe by promoting innovative solutions and facilitating the transfer of technologies and know-how. 

The first organization in the South- East region to implement foresight methods to shape public policy.

As radical innovations are having a profound impact globallyon the macroeconomic environment, the Region of Central Macedonia is monitoringclosely following the developments, trends and variables that favour or affect it or negatively affecting its development.
Institutions and executives from the private and public sector have explored through a participatory and dynamic process (Thematic Participatory Workshop) the variables that will the innovation and entrepreneurship environment of the region with time horizon 2030, identified their dynamics and evaluated their interaction. The findings provided input to the working group for the development of four scenarios that will define the future of innovation in the region of Central Macedonia in the coming decade. These scenarios identified
the development of a proposal of three strategic axes, developing in a stepwise manner in three different periods, which will strengthen the resilience of the region and prepare it to face the conditions in these four futures.

The study is available in Greek.

The project concerns the operation of the One Stop Liaison Office Mechanism of the Regional Authority, the development of digital tools aiming to support the regional ecosystem, while at the same time monitoring and evaluating the Smart Specialization Strategy.

One Stop Liaison Office Operation
Horizon Scanning (Greek)
Innovation 2030 (Greek)
RIS3 Strategy Monitoring
RIS3 Strategy Evaluation
Updating the RIS3 Strategy 2021-2027

The project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund

GIZ Profile: sustainable development for a liveable future

As a service provider in the field of international cooperation for sustainable development and international education work, we are dedicated to shaping a future worth living around the world. We have over 50 years of experience in a wide variety of areas, including economic development and employment promotion, energy and the environment, and peace and security. The diverse expertise of our federal enterprise is in demand around the globe – from the German Government, European Union institutions, the United Nations, the private sector, and governments of other countries. We work with businesses, civil society actors and research institutions, fostering successful interaction between development policy and other policy fields and areas of activity. Our main commissioning party is the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

How GIZ uses Foresight Methods: As a federal enterprise working in the fields of international cooperation for sustainable development and international education, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is greatly affected by the business environment in which it operates and by trends in Germany, Europe and the world. Dealing with the resulting uncertainty, complexity and fast-paced change is often very challenging. This makes it important for GIZ to understand the underlying drivers of change and possible future developments so that it can prepare for the future and for the crises it will have to address, ultimately making the company and its staff more resilient.  

OECD has released the Strategic Foresight Toolkit for Resilient Public Policy, designed to help policymakers anticipate and navigate future challenges and opportunities.

By exploring 25 potential disruptions across environmental, technological, economic, social, and geopolitical domains, the Toolkit equips governments with a practical, five-step foresight methodology to challenge assumptions, create scenarios, stress-test strategies, and develop future-ready policies. It includes facilitation guides, case studies, and actionable insights to support resilience in an uncertain world.

Today, there is broad consensus that it must be the task of politics to ensure justice and freedom across generations. Not only courts and social movements worldwide are calling for a strengthening of forward-looking and provident governance. Many political actors within and outside the German government are also demanding a strengthening of capacities for long-term thinking and action in order to better meet the major challenges of the 21st century. How can we succeed in making policy more forward-looking? How can we strengthen our ability to deal with uncertainty and complexity? How would processes and structures have to change to achieve this? What role can strategic foresight (SF) play here?
These questions were addressed in the study conducted by the Fraunhofer ISI Foresight Team together with Prof. Sylvia Veit (administrative scientist at the University of Kassel) on behalf of the Federal Chancellery.
The aim was to examine the status quo in Germany and to develop various options for institutionalising strategic foresight as a process, method and approach in the German government's policy and administration, and to evaluate their advantages and disadvantages. This should create a basis for discussion for the further anchoring of strategic foresight in government action.

4CF The Futures Literacy Company is a consultancy entirely focused on strategic foresight and long-term strategies. For nearly two decades, 4CF has been on the mission to help its clients prepare for an uncertain tomorrow. The Company has executed hundreds of projects for private companies, public institutions and international entities, including the European Commission and its agencies (EUDA, ENISA), FAO, UNFCCC, UNESCO, UNEP and UNDP. 4CF is at the forefront of global innovation, and actively contributes to the development of cutting-edge foresight tools, including 4CF HalnyX (Delphi platform), 4CF Sprawlr, 4CF FLEx.

Arctik is a Brussels-based communications agency recognised for its strategic and creative communication capacity in the field of sustainability. Arctik develops tailored public relations and communication strategies that take both objectives and resulting impact into account. We facilitate the creation of communities and networks that contribute towards circulating content, whilst cultivating meaningful dialogues and synergies between influencers and decision-makers.

Arctik has substantial experience in designing and implementing communication campaigns and projects which mix creative communication and sustainability. We believe in communication campaigns which provide a setting where opportunities are created, and knowledge is shared between actors. It is an occasion to convey a message and collect insights and intelligence.
Our team has a strong commitment to sustainability. We incorporate sustainable values into operations Arctik has substantial experience in designing and implementing communication campaigns and projects which mix creative communication and sustainability. We believe in communication campaigns which provide a setting where opportunities are created, and knowledge is shared between actors. It is an occasion to convey a message and collect insights and intelligence. and consider environmental and social factors in every business decision, while encouraging our partners and clients to think circular! Arctik is also registered to obtain the Brussels ‘Enterprise ecodynamique’ label. 

Arctik, as part of Technopolis Group is present in more than 10 countries with 300 consultants originating from +45 countries and speaking +30 languages. This diversity offers a unique perspective on what local-level stakeholders are receptive to. 

Our offices are located in : • Austria • Belgium • Colombia • France • Germany • Ivory Coast • Netherlands • Greece • Portugal • Sweden • Ivory Cost • Colombia • United Kingdom.

Our solutions: Strategy • Messaging and copywriting • Online and offline engagement • Thought-provoking design • Web services • Project Management • Video and animation • Data-driven communication • Events • Social media campaigns & monitoring • Knowledge management and Capitalisation • Media and visibility.

Our expertise: Regional Policy, Circular Economy, Climate Services, Education, Entrepreneurship, Science & Innovation.

Arctik is part of Technopolis |group|
Website www.arctik.eu
LinkedIn linkedin.com/company/arctik/
Bluesky bsky.app/profile/arctik.eu 

Decision makers are faced with a world characterised by increasing turbulence, uncertainty, novelty, and ambiguity. These conditions make it more difficult to assess risks when making strategic decisions or planning for the long-term. This project from the European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC) EU Policy Lab starting 2023 presents a foresight approach to increase preparedness for unexpected developments and the risks they could create.

Foresight methods offer a way to consider and focus on risks that may be beyond the scope of traditional quantitative and qualitative risk assessment approaches. Several snapshots of the future depict different worlds that have undergone substantial changes as a consequence of emerging developments. An analysis of the risks inherent in the possible futures identified ten risk clusters that are relevant for decision makers, and mapped future developments that might lead to them.The same development pathways that could lead to risks can also create opportunities, and the study provides some examples. Decision makers face the challenge of mitigating the adverse effects of risks, while reaping the benefits of potential opportunities. This study also presents the results of a Delphi survey that evaluated the scope and severity of risks. Three of the 40 risks identified in this study were assessed to be potentially existential for humanity: 1) environmental degradation, 2) environmental disasters, and 3) loss of power by humans. The project started in 2023 and will run until 2024.

Download the Risks on the horizon report  

Read the blog post from the authors  

The Polycrisis Exploration Workshop

The Polycrisis tool draws on insights from the Risks on the horizon foresight study. Collective intelligence exercises such as this can bring new knowledge and broader perspectives into policy making, sparking new ideas, and helping to co-create impactful interdisciplinary solutions. The workshop facilitates strategic conversations about current and future risks, disasters, and polycrisis. 

You can use the tool to:
• Enhance risk awareness by exploring a broad spectrum of risks
• Map future polycrisis and explore their interconnected and cascading impacts in your area of work
• Identify policy interventions to mitigate risks. 

Read instructions and download the materials

Read more from EU Policy Lab blog
 

The aim of this study was to serve as one of the inputs to the update and to initiate a discussion on the possibilities of updating the Czech republic 2030 strategy. In order to ensure that this strategic document reflects the dynamic developments on the global and domestic scene, mechanisms for regular reviews and updates of the objectives and measures have been proposed. Given the events of the last 3 years (especially the Covid-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine), it is relevant to review the relevance of the assumptions regarding the long-term development of the Czech Republic, which served as the basis for the original wording of the strategic objectives and targeting of the document.
The role of České priority was to provide foresight exercises in order to reach two goals:

• Assess the relevance of existing goals: the problems and challenges facing society are changing and so are the definition of objectives for further development. The task of this section is therefore also to determine whether the original ČR 2030 goals are still relevant in the context of change and respond to the major challenges that society is facing and will continue to face in the coming decades.
• Identify blind spots: there may be issues or opportunities that the document does not cover - i.e. blind spots. The next task of this part of the update is to identify such gaps to increase the comprehensiveness of the document.

The project was implemented in the form of workshops, which were attended by experts and representatives of public institutions and ministries. On the basis of pre-prepared scenarios of development, the participants had to identify the resulting challenges, opportunities and areas that have not yet been covered in the CR 2030. The list of these areas was subsequently consulted with representatives of public institutions. These expert consultations were complemented by input from the general public through a creative competition held in September 2022.

https://www.ceskepriority.cz/foresight#co_je_foresight 

From October 2022 to March 2023, we ran a forecasting tournament with a total of 54 questions. Almost all of our forecasting questions were developed in cooperation with 16 different public institutions and ministerial departments. Each institution or department defined its most useful forecasting topics, participated in a workshop to define specific questions with us, and was later provided with the results. This was intended as a proof of concept of one possible approach to incorporating forecasting in public decision-making.

Once defined, our forecasting questions were then posted on a private Metaculus sub-domain (in Czech), where an average of 72 forecasters had the opportunity to address them as they would any other question on Metaculus (median of 18 predictions per user). Throughout the tournament, we produced 16 reports detailing the rationales and forecasts, to be used by the cooperating institutions.
A handful of our partners have already reported acting on the information/judgment presented in our reports. This has concerned, for example, the national foreclosure issue (some 6% of the total population have debts in arrears) where the debt relief process is being redesigned midst strong lobbying and insufficient personal capacities; or the probabilities of outlier scenarios for European macroeconomic development, which was requested by the Slovak Ministry of Finance to help calibrate their existing judgements.

It also seems useful to explore various approaches to grow the number of policymakers with personal experience and skills in forecasting. In our case, we found curiosity and willingness to try forecasting even in unexpected institutional locations (i.e. the Czech R&I funding body). This makes us more confident that the “external forecasts” approach (as compared to building internal prediction tournaments or focusing on advancing forecasting skills of public servants) is worth investigating further precisely because it allows us to detect and draw on this interest irrespective of institutional and seniority distinctions and resource constraints.
While we hope that any readers with an interest in forecasting may find our experience useful, we expect that both this and any future projects of ours make it easier for other teams to work towards similar goals. To that effect, the write-up also contains an Annex of “Methodological Guidelines,” where we outline in more explicit terms the questions and decisions that we found were important to tackle when running the project, and what they may entail.

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