Olive sector, a crucial part of the Mediterranean economy, generates significant by-products (wastewater, pomace, pruning, leaves) that are often underutilized and pose environmental risks. Valorising these by-products offers a sustainable solution, promoting economic growth, circular economy, and environmental protection. In addition to this, extracting bioactive molecules supports various industries, while composting pruning enhances soil fertility, and treated wastewater can be used as organic fertilizer.In this context, there is a need to establish vocational education and training (VET) programs to equip young graduates with the necessary skills to implement sustainable, innovative, and cutting-edge valorisation techniques and sustainable practices. SUST-OLIVET project will offer this opportunity to integrate modern courses on innovative methodologies of olive trees by-product valorisation. Thus, strengthening education’s responsiveness to labour market needs.The project outcomes address challenges such as the quality of VET delivery in relevance to olive sector needs. SUST-OLIVET project aims also to cover a lack of supply and gaps in training and education on the competences of professionals in valorisation of olive sector and oil production by-products and relevant processes aspects, and raise their awareness to sustainable growth, as well as to promote the exchange of best practices not only in terms of specialised education but also in terms of applying quality assurance best practices in VET, as well as to the utilisation of ICT tools. The project will contribute to:•SDG 4: Quality education through open-source digital resources.•SDG 8: Decent work and economic growth by providing green skills.•SDG 9: Resilient infrastructure and sustainable industrialization through best practices in resource efficiency and waste reduction.•SDG 12: Responsible consumption and production by upskilling in by-product valorisation and waste reduction.

Food law is an evolving domain, continuously adapting to address new societal needs and emerging challenges. The lack of awareness among Food Business Operators regarding these regulatory changes negatively impacts food safety and consumer rights. In Kosovo, aligning national food legislation with EU food law is essential for ensuring legal consistency and compliance with European standards. K-FLEX therefore, aims to establish Continuing Vocational Education and Training programs that enhance professional knowledge and competences in the food sector.One of the significant objectives of K-FLEX project is the digitalization of VET, which is crucial for the modernization of education and training in the food sector. Additionally, K-FLEX emphasizes inclusive and high-quality VET courses that incorporate updated legislative frameworks and industry trends.This project supports Kosovo’s food sector professionals in adapting to the evolving regulatory and technological landscapes. Training programs tailored to industry needs ensure that professionals are well-equipped with digital skills, language proficiency, and regulatory knowledge. This approach not only improves food safety and quality but also boosts employment prospects for VET learners in the food sector. Furthermore, the integration of private sector input into curriculum design ensures that vocational training remains relevant and responsive to industry demands. In conclusion, K-FLEX represents a strategic initiative for enhancing Kosovo’s food sector through education, digitalization, and regulatory alignment with EU standards. By addressing key challenges such as food safety, legal compliance, and workforce development, the project contributes to the broader objectives of the European Green Deal and the UN 2030 Agenda. Strengthening vocational education will ensure that Kosovo’s food sector remains competitive and sustainable in the evolving European landscape.

The textile industry is highly of relevant importance both in Morocco and Jordan accounting for 165k jobs in the former and 60k in the later, making one of the largest industrial sector for both countries. However, most SME companies have limited access to services like testing, training, research, studies, technology and financial funding instruments. Also, there are not any focal points in these two countries that fulfil the knowledge triangle, bringing together enterprises, universities and research centers, especially as far as the advanced textiles' production is concerned.FOSTEX project aims to fill the gap in the area of specialized services for the textile sector, with the establishment of four advanced textiles’ centers located at the participating HEIs in Jordan and Morocco. These centers will play the role of focal points for the textile sector and relevant stakeholders to bloom innovations and promoting entrepreneurship. A customized capacity building program will be assembled by EU partners, experts in training and in advanced textiles, in order to improve the management and technical skills of experts running the centers as well as providing EU experience with best practices. Additional outputs which will catalyze the activities of the centers are the drafting of an entrepreneurial plan for each country supplemented by the roundtables on innovation and entrepreneurship, and fostering synergic meetings among textile experts from EU with partner countries’ HEIs and textile industry. A custom service list will be defined with support from EU partners for each advanced textiles’ center according to sectorial needs at each region of influence. Ultimately, the goal is to foster the university-industry collaboration to support the development of innovations and entrepreneurship in the textile sector in Morocco and Jordan to generate an ecosystem of advanced textile materials.

Medical Schools in the Middle East are currently suffering from a critical shortage of scientists and academicians holding higher degrees in the various disciplines of basic medical sciences (BMS). For most of these Schools, the requirements for a Bachelor degree in Medicine include the successful completion of three years of intense coursework in BMS, prior to passing through three additional years of patient-oriented, bedside clinical coursework. Thus, iBMS-JO project responds to the needs to graduate students with deep background in BMS. This can be achieved by the establishment the first innovative intercalated BSc (iBSc) programs in BMS. Moreover, Telemedicine Labs (TL) will also be established to support the research activities of students and faculty, as well as providing services to the health care facilities. The establishment of an intercalated BSc (iBSc) programs in BMS is an opportunity for students to learn more about a particular topic, to develop transferable skills and/or participate in a more in-depth research project than previously available as part of a medical degree. This is can be offered after the 3rd or 4th year, which could also include an intercalated year into their standard medical programs, making them a 7-year degree, where an intercalation typically lasts one year. The expected outputs of this program include: n. 6 accredited iBSc programs in BMS, capacity building for the staff (at least 48): a) to design curricula in line with the Bologna process, b) to design and develop inter/multidisciplinary course curricula in clinical nutrition (at least 7 new modules, 120 students/year); and c) to apply innovative and flexible teaching and learning methods. Moreover, TL will provide research facilities for students and staff (n. >40 research project/year), which will support the iBSc programs and function as life-long learning resources and Centres of Excellence in medical education and research.

Design is crucial to India’s manufacturing transformation. By 2020 India will need more than 60,000 designers in a 2.47 billion euros market. Progress to enhance design education is not uniform across institutions. Modern convergence of technology, design thinking, user-centred and experience design demand collaborative trans and inter/multi-disciplinary approaches to curriculum evolution. Bonds between industry and HEIs must be strong by growing collaborations for new product development, internships, joint projects and other educational and research activities. This project aims at establishing innovation capacities in the design sector of India through improved education built on transfer of good practices and curriculum content from the EU. It will establish 3 equipped Design & Innovation Centres in local universities. These will provide common ground, with industry, for (a) developing innovative and permanent methods for Research and Design approaches (b) establishing cross-sectoral projects for collaboration and co-learning, (c) establishing Inter-industry projects to facilitate the inclusion of design thinking approaches, (d) deploying extreme affordability principles, (e) developing community-based programs enabling designers, craftsmen and artisans, (f) modernization and internationalization of Indian HEIs by improving product and service design courses, following state of the art methodologies in design thinking, sustainability, social innovation, ethics etc.DESINNO seeks proliferation of similar centres in India and promotion of research and design projects by creating a permanent research innovation and training network and virtual tools. HEIs, researchers, students and industry are expected to benefit the most. The industry will gain access to modern value adding technologies, methodologies and highly trained professionals leading to drastic improvements of Indian Design for the benefit of the economy and society.