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What began as a focused effort to strengthen research and innovation policy in the Western Balkans has now grown into something significantly larger in scope. POLICY ENLARGE, the successor to POLICY ANSWERS, picks up where its predecessor left off; while responding to a changed geopolitical reality and an expanded European enlargement agenda.
Building on a strong foundation
POLICY ANSWERS is part of a long-lasting effort that started in 2006 with the launch of the Steering Platform on Research for the Western Balkans. Building on the legacy of several projects, it spent four years (2022–2026) further developing Steering Platforms — also on Education and Training as well as Culture. It strengthened relationships and tools to support R&I policymaking across the Western Balkans, created the Western Balkans Info Hub (significantly upgrading the previous WBC-RTI.INFO), deployed innovation vouchers and mobility grants, and built genuine networks between universities, SMEs, and government agencies. As coordinator Elke Dall reflected at the project’s close, perhaps its most lasting contribution was connecting “local, practice-oriented activities with the broader regional and European policy landscape”.
POLICY ENLARGE does not start from scratch. It inherits these platforms, networks, and the institutional trust that comes with them. The project’s spine remains: high-level ministerial meetings through the Western Balkans Steering Platforms, thematic policy workshops, capacity building, targeted calls, and the Info Hub as a shared knowledge commons. The philosophy, structured dialogue, peer learning, and building regional trust, carries over in full.
A larger map
The most visible change is geographic. While POLICY ANSWERS centred on the six Western Balkans economies (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia), POLICY ENLARGE extends to all ten EU enlargement economies; adding Georgia, Moldova, Türkiye, and Ukraine. The 2023 granting of candidate status to Ukraine and Moldova was a pivotal moment, enlarging the EU’s strategic perimeter and raising the stakes for R&I cooperation across the region.
Each of these new additions brings different challenges. Ukraine is engaged in wartime reconstruction planning, with R&I policy forming part of long-term resilience-building. Moldova has recently adopted its own Smart Specialisation Strategy. Georgia is in early-stage ERA integration. Türkiye has a long history of participation in EU Framework Programmes but more limited S3 progress. POLICY ENLARGE will meet each economy where it is.
A consortium built on continuity, and extended by new voices
The consortium reflects both continuity and expansion. A core group of organisations carried forward directly from POLICY ANSWERS: research institutes, universities, and innovation agencies from across the Western
Balkans that built the relationships and tools now being handed forward. ZSI, which coordinated POLICY ANSWERS, passes the coordination role to RCISD, a Hungarian SME with an extensive track record in EU R&I
collaboration, while continuing as a key partner leading the policy dialogue and joint actions work packages. Alongside them, RIINVEST, STP MNE, MIR, IEN, UNSA, UNIBL, UniBa, DLR, FBA, and NASRI bring experience from
the predecessor project into the new consortium.
The four new enlargement economies are each represented by national institutions with strong R&I policy credentials: the Georgian Institute for Research & Innovation (GIRI), the National Agency for Research and
Development (NARD) from Moldova, TUBITAK from Türkiye, and the Institute for Economics and Forecasting (IEF) from Ukraine. Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design (MOME) joins the partnership to lead communication,
dissemination, and the upgraded Enlargement Info Hub. Six associated partners, national research agencies and ministries responsible for education and innovation policy in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia,
Montenegro, and Serbia, anchor the project’s relationship with governmental stakeholders across the region.
The consortium
Albania
Austria
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Georgia
Germany
Hungary
Kosovo*
Moldova
Montenegro
North Macedonia
Poland
Serbia
Türkiye
Ukraine
POLICY ENLARGE runs for 36 months and is coordinated by Béla Kardon of RCISD (Regionális Információs és Fejlesztő Tudásközpont Kft.), leading a consortium of 15 full partners and 6 associated organisations across Europe and the enlargement region.