BIODAQUA Meetings
- Official Agenda for BIODAQUA Startup Meeting, Athens February 2002
- 2nd project meeting, 17-19 February 2002, Athens, Greece
- BIODAQUA Partners Ancona Meeting
Project Progress
Europe
Mrs Eleftheriou presented a verbal report on progress from the European side. Briefly: she had been informed on Sept. 5 on an informal visit to the EU/Canada office that there were difficulties on the Canadian side with the possibility of the project’s being axed. The BIODAQUA 2 nd payment could not be made until the Interim Report was accepted and it could not be accepted until there was a positive assessment from the Canadians. Therefore all activities which necessitated expenditure in the second part of the project, such as attendance at the Directors meeting in November, and the projected partners meeting should not be undertaken. Exchanges that were underway should continue and a new action plan should be drawn up, with an up-to-date list of possible exchanges. There then followed a period of complete administrative stalemate until the middle of February, a period of more than 5 months, when the Canadian HRDC relaxed its unilateral suspension of the project. Nevertheless the project’s activities continued, on both sides of the Atlantic, the exchanges that had been planned did go ahead, new ones were planned, and eventually in February after the lifting of the Canadian suspension, the European BIODAQUA Interim Report was accepted and the second payment was made. These continuing difficulties have been well documented in the exchange of correspondence with the partners and with the Commission and at this stage she felt it was not helpful to further publicise the exchanges, which had culminated in her visit to the EU/Canada Programme office on March 17, to discuss the BIODAQUA project in person with Mr D.Sammaritano, and Ms S.Dahl. This meeting was reported in detail to the partners ( Annex 2 ) and the questions which were raised by the Commission representatives formed the basis of the meeting agenda ( Annex 1 ).
Canada
Dr Forward presented his summary report of progress since June 2003, which includes a consolidated list of all student applications from each partner university. ( Annex 3 ).
Much effort had gone into the (successful) attempts to get HRDC to lift its suspension of the project, with all the HRDC requests for further information, reports, financial audits, etc, having been met. He had carried out increased recruitment with the cooperation of the Canadian partners and above all with their International Offices, and this had met with real success, in that there were 37 applicants for 25 places, and a special course had been designed for those applicants (by far the majority) who had opted for the University of Cork. This large exchange has now taken place and with its completion, the revised mobility target of 25 students has been met. Nevertheless, he felt that all students required a lot of help in finding a suitable exchange, and that a more structured list of exchange opportunities (specific projects) with dates and deadlines is needed. It is his feeling that the project is now becoming better known and gaining in popularity with some Canadian institutions, and that it has numerous benefits and strengths that should be built on in the future (feedback from both the University of Ancona, the University of Cork and the University of New Brunswick back this up).
