Save the date for the AFRAN Forum - 4-6 November 2024 in Canberra
Building on both countries’ world-class research capacities, as well as on the strong industrial and cultural relationship Australia and France have nurtured, the Embassy of France in Australia and the Australian-French Association for Research and Innovation are organising a key flagship initiative: the 2024 AFRAN Forum on:
“The role of research and innovation in industry, policy and public dialogue”
This event will bring together Australian and French stakeholders of the education-research-industry-policy ecosystem to discuss current global challenges.
Research and innovation play a crucial role in addressing the critical challenges of the 21st century. Research-informed public dialogue, policy making and innovation are central to global efforts towards sustainability and a key contribution of knowledge-based countries. France and Australia have a major role to play in this context, both individually as global research powers, and jointly, through their longstanding cooperative relationship across science, culture and research and innovation of many types. Both France and Australia have a rich and diverse landscape of public and private bodies conducting research and innovation, and developing novel funding, monitoring, and evaluation and translation activities to ensure positive impacts for society.
The event will offer:
Keynotes highlighting specific topical issues:
Effective means of engaging between academia and industry
Research for the benefit of our societies
Strengthening the dialogue in multilateral negotiations
Workshops with students, researchers, industry, community representatives, and policy leaders (depending on the workshop) from Australia and France. These discussions will help inform on Australian and French ecosystems, their differences, strengths and challenges, share good practices, and make actionable recommendations on avenues of cooperation.
People’s aspirations, education, training, and work integrated learning
Challenges of translating research into innovations: intellectual property, commercialisation investment, incubator models, education issues, societal impacts
Research and policy, obstacles to evidence-based policy making, the role of research in governments
Research, innovation and public opinion: trust in science, knowledge as a human right, democratic governance of research in societies
An innovation hackathon “mitigating climate change” to adapt the French flagship event called “24 heures chrono de l’entrepreneuriat” (24 hours for entrepreneurship) to the Australian context. The innovation hackathon will lead groups of 4-5 PhD students to the creation of their company on low emission and sustainable solutions. They will experience the potential for translation of an innovative idea, and discover that the business culture functions as an incubator for research creativity. Finally, they will learn to establish a dialogue between the complexity of research and the empirical experience of the market. The hackathon will last a full day divided into learning phases, creation phases and breaks. At the end, each group will pitch their company project in front of a panel of sponsors.
Women in Science: The Australian-French Association for Research and Innovation (AFRAN) teams up with the Australian Global Health Alliance and the Embassy of France in Australia to screen a French documentary: “La fabrique des pandémies 2022”. This documentary investigates the links between biodiversity loss, human activity, and the emergence of pandemics, emphasizing the need for ecological balance to prevent future health crises. It will be followed by a panel discussion with experts and a drink to explore the role of women engaged for the care of our environment and global health.
More information: afran.org@gmail.com
