TWINNING COORDINATION FOR ENHANCED SCIENTIFIC CAPACITY IN WATER QUALITY, FOOD SAFETY, TRACEABILITY, AND AUTHENTICITY BY USING INNOVATIVE APPROACHES

SPECTRA aims to improve AUTH R&I capacities to strengthen its scientific reputation, attractiveness, visibility, and networking channels. SPECTRA will stimulate scientific excellence and innovation in key research areas of Water Quality and Food Safety, Quality & Traceability (WQ&FSAT) for addressing the challenges that emanate from ongoing and accelerating climate changes in Greece. SPECTRA approach will be achieved by a unique combination of research activities, “hands-on” training, academic and non-academic mobilities /courses and workshops on scientific and complementary transferable skills facilitated by the academic-non-academic composition of the consortium. It will reinforce R&I and knowledge transfer capacity of AUTH’s research staff, including its permanent scientists and Early-Stage Researchers (ESR), fostering collaboration between academia, industry, and stakeholders in Greece within a sustainable research framework, promoting international networking, mobility, and integration into the European Research Area (ERA). At scientific level, it is expected to enlarge the community of competitive prestigious researchers at AUTH in WQ&FSAT, stronger and better-connected to a core of international and relevant R&I systems, supported by skilled R&I managers with their international networks. At social level, it is expected an improvement in WQ&FSAT by providing new breakthrough scientific knowledge on quality of water resources, advancing food safety supervision performance, increasing consumer and market confidence in Greek food product safety, facilitating monitoring, inspections, decision-making by competent authorities, and supply chain actors and policymakers and enhancing networking, and engaging with food safety high-level experts. At an economic level, the project will contribute to the development of an innovative WQ&FSAT industry and the profitability of regional companies through new product development, approaches and tools, innovation support, and job creation.