Region Västerbotten, together with The Yes Way initiative, has chosen eXpression Umeå as one of three actors to participate in a pilot project aimed at promoting social sustainability. The aim is to create better conditions for a strengthened, inclusive and gender-equal innovation system.
For us, inclusion, equality and equity have always been important issues. That's why we're excited about the opportunity to delve further into these areas with experts. Knowledge is not static, we must constantly challenge ourselves to develop and improve," says Barbro Renkel, CEO of eXpression Umeå.
The programme is part of Region Innovation Management in Västerbotten's initiative for sustainable development and is funded by Tillväxtverket. It runs throughout 2022 and is primarily aimed at innovation and business promotion organisations in the business community such as science parks, innovation offices and incubators.
The aim is for the region to become stronger at supporting innovation by raising awareness of inclusion, diversity, gender equality and norm creativity.
Ten organisations have applied and three have joined a pilot round funded by Region Västerbotten. In order to reach a demographic and organisational breadth, Almi Nord, eXpression Umeå and Skellefteå Science City have been selected.
We need to take advantage of all the resources and innovative ideas available to strengthen Västerbotten as an innovative and smart region," says Anna Pettersson, Regional Development Director at Region Västerbotten, in a press release.
About The Yes Way initiative
The Yes Way develops business and innovation support in the Nordic region with a focus on gender equality, diversity and inclusion. Since its inception in 2018 at Ideon Innovation in Lund, The Yes Way has developed programmes, methods and tools to attract and support entrepreneurs and innovators who are hard to reach in today's innovation support systems. Visit The Yes Ways website for more info.