GOOD WINDS FROM SOUTH AND EAST

International cooperation is a proof of life for scientific organisations. But while many different types of effort are involved, the execution of projects in partnership is the one that produces the highest benefits – if the relationship is properly managed. Because science is not the only thing being shared.

INESC TEC participates in various projects, but today we will highlight two initiatives, because they are a first, each in its own way. We will leave the technical details to the news section and focus on the uniqueness of their character.

One is denoetd SECRETS and the other is called GRESBAS. Their commonality:  they are the very first projects we have with Morocco and Turkey. The former, funded by IRESEN, an agency from the Moroccan Ministry of Energy, has already started, and the latter has been approved as part of the European programme ERA-NET smartgrids+, and will start in April.

The lack of contact, collaboration, partnership with our closest neighbour country, after Spain, is puzzling. This confirms that the Gibraltar strait put a barrir in more ways than the physical – with so much common history between Portugal and Morroco, shouldn't we build a bridge from a cement  made of positive emotions, benefiting both parties?

Turkey is not close geographically – there are however surprising commonalities in our languages: “orange” in Turkish is “portokal” because Portuguese merchants brought to Eastern Europe sweet oranges from China, which quickly replaced the sour oranges traditional in the Mediterranean region. Any reason is a good reason if the motive is noble, and the collaboration between two countries at the extremes of Southern Europe is reason enough to hope for good results. For INESC TEC, the paradox: its world is expanding and yet it is becoming smaller, and filled with close friends.