Staff exchange between the partner organizations is one of the key mechanisms to generate institutional learning. At the end of March 2023, Alberto Giacometti from Nordregio carried a week-long placement at Co-PLAN, Institute for Habitat Development in Tirana.

The agenda was filled with many activities combining joint work meetings, trainings, and contributing to local events. One key highlight was the training session with junior Co-PLAN researchers on how to bridge the research policy gap, including how to approach and deliver research-based input that is of relevance to policy processes, and policymakers. The session covered a broad range of policy processes related to planning, territorial strategies, among others, as well as the formal and informal means in which policymakers receive input that influences policy directions: e.g., municipal strategies or plans. To read the report for this training, click here.

Nordregio also delivered a presentation on the concept of ‘just green transition’ and its political, economic and social implications, at the National Forum on Climate Change organized within the Green-AL project, led by CoPLAN. In synergy with his teaching exchange at POLIS University, Marjan Nikolov, from CEA, also participated of the joint activities organized during this secondment.

These visits are done in order to increase knowledge exchange between partner organisations, as well as boost interactions between the host and guest researchers. This dynamic and polycentric model of knowledge exchange will continue throughout the project duration.