RDA Hunter CEO, Todd Williams, addressing the audience at launch of Australia’s First Smart Specialisation, Smart Specialisation Strategy for the Hunter Region:
Good Morning Ladies and Gentlemen – Welcome to the launch of Australia’s first smart specialisation strategy. My name is Todd Williams. I’m the CEO of Regional Development Australia Hunter.
Before going any further, I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners and custodians of the land on which we are meeting today, the Ngunnawal people, and pay my respect to elders past and present.
Today it’s my great pleasure to welcome the Prime Minister of Australia, the Honourable Malcolm Turnbull to officially launch the strategy.
I also warmly welcome: His Excellency German Ambassador to Australia, Dr Christoph Müller; His Excellency Ambassador of the European Union to Australia and New Zealand Mr. Sem Fabrizi; Senator Arthur Sinodinos – good to see you and thank you for your support; Ministers, Senators, Members of Parliament and VIP’s.
Thank you for joining us today. I very much, appreciate your support and your endorsement of this initiative from regional Australia.
RDA Hunter is an Economic Development organisation. We’ve never been afraid to try new things. And we’re extremely pleased that two of our initiatives are recognised in The National Innovation and Science Agenda.
It’s clear to us that in a connected global market we must keep changing and re-inventing ourselves to be competitive. We must continue to innovate to drive economic growth.
We know other regions in the world have prepared for the future, and successfully transitioned their economies. We need to learn from them and benchmark ourselves against them. These regions represent both strong competition and powerful partnership opportunities.
In the European Union, one of the effective ways that economies are being transformed and jobs created, is through strong Innovation policy and regional leadership.
For many EU regions, this has been instrumental in transitioning their economies to a knowledge and service base. The key way of facilitating this transition has been to undertake a Smart Specialisation Strategy. Or “S3” for short…
This OECD and European Commission platform is an innovative approach to economic development with a proven methodology.
An S3 puts the emphasis on a region to show leadership and take control of its future by defining its competitive advantages. It was clear that we needed a strategy for innovation-driven growth. So we developed one!
Over the past 2 years, during the development of our S3, we’ve engaged extensively, had many robust discussions and confronted some home truths. But, we have defined the Hunter’s competitive advantages, the areas that are most likely to create prosperity and jobs for the future.
The corner stone of economic development is talent. If you have talented people there is more entrepreneurship, more economic diversity and our communities are more vibrant.
In the quest for talent, we’re going ok, but there’s room for improvement!
It’s crucial that we attract and retain talented people to actualise the regions competitive strengths.
Our S3 identifies 7 areas of competitive advantage and 13 strategic actions to drive economic growth by improving the region’s innovation network.
It also highlights the need for increased collaboration between Industry, Researchers, Investors and supporting innovation policy.
We are really pleased to be the first in Australia to have done this and honoured to have the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, to officially launch Australia’s first Smart Specialisation Strategy.
Let me now introduce Cabinet Secretary and Senator for NSW Arthur Sinodinos – welcome Senator.
Smart Specialisation Strategy for the Hunter Region
View the coverage of the launch https://rdahunter.org.au/news-events/a-more-exciting-time-to-live-in-the-hunter