Between June 27 and 28, 2019, Gilda Niculescu, Head of Development Department within South Muntenia Regional Development Agency, presented the Danube S3 Cluster project at the EUSDR Annual Forum, in Bucharest.

The project was presented at the 8th edition of the EUSDR Annual Forum within the DTP Plenary Session The present and future roles of the Danube Transnational Programme (DTP) in the Danube region, being selected due to the fact that the project theme, namely the promotion of transnational cluster cooperation the agro-food sector, is in line with the priorities of Romania's exercise of the Presidency of the EU Strategy for the Danube Region.

Also, its results were presented during the capitalization session of Thematic Pole 1, Innovative Ecosystem for SMEs, organized as side-event during the EUSDR Annual Forum. The workshop was organized by the Coordinators of the EUSDR Priority Area 8 from Baden Wurttemberg and Croatia. Cluster initiatives are well-known approaches to support competitiveness and innovation of the private sector. Although originally intended to also contribute to regional development, over the last year most cluster initiatives became more and more disconnected from regional development. Recent studies in the Danube Region have shown that a dedicated interaction and mutual cooperation between regional developers and cluster initiatives is still an exception. Regional innovation strategies, if exist, are not necessarily aligned with related cluster strategies.

The side-event shed some lights on good practices how cluster initiatives and regions in the Danube Region successfully worked together to jointly support regional transformation and strengthening competitiveness of firms. Attention was given on key success factors of the interplay between both, what are the tasks and responsibilities between cluster initiatives and regional developers and how this kind of cooperation shall be facilitated in the post-2020 ERDF area.