Exploring the role of cross-border regional factors in innovation in the agri-food sector

Innovations in the agri-food sector are necessary to increase resource efficiency and sustainability and contribute to the EU’s Green Deal objective to become climate neutral by 2050. Enterprises are a main initiator of innovations and innovation is facilitated by enterprises’ cooperation with other stakeholders. In cross-border regions, cooperation is particularly challenging due to differences in language, network structures and the economy. This can explain the underutilization of border regions’ economic potential. European Cohesion Policy promotes cross-border regional integration to ease cross-border cooperation but lacks insight and understanding of enterprises’ situations and the role of different stakeholders within the cross-border setting. It is still unknown how the cross-border setting influences the way enterprises work on agri-food innovation. Hence, a better understanding of innovation in cross-border regions is required for informed decision making in European Cohesion Policies. This thesis explored how cross-border regional factors determine innovation in the agri-food sector.Chapter 2 investigates the relation between factors defining cross-border business interaction and innovativeness in cross-border regions. These interactions can be influenced by factors concerning the availability of science and knowledge bases, socio-cultural proximity, accessibility, institutional set-up, and governance. Using secondary data and survey data, Chapter 2 confirmed that differences in innovativeness levels between countries are related to factors hindering cross-border business interaction. Chapter 2 concludes that the investigated factors are interrelated and should be collectively analyzed for strategic decision making in cross-border regions. The findings of Chapter 2 formed the base for further exploration of the relation of cross-border cooperation and agri-food innovation in Chapter 3 and 4, and for the identification of regional stakeholders’ viewpoints on facilitating cross-border cooperation in Chapter 5.Chapter 3 investigates how the innovation environment affects product innovation processes of agri-food enterprises located in a cross-border region. The innovation environment is beyond enterprises direct control and comprises access to finance, university knowledge and customers. The market success of innovations depends on the innovation environment. The results of the case study indicate that innovation processes were mainly influenced by factors regarding the innovation environment at a national level, and that cross-border factors and cooperation were rare in the Dutch-German cross-border region. Chapter 3 concludes that enterprises should integrate customers and business partners - especially across the border - during research and technological development to facilitate the innovation process and ease market entry – also across the border.Chapter 4 studies the provision and use of innovation support services to explore their opportunities and limitations in a cross-border region. Innovation support services assist enterprises to work within the innovation environment and offer support in network building or demand articulation. The results show that the provision and use of innovation support services is nationally concentrated and only a single cross-border innovation support service provider was identified, i.e. the Interreg program. The Interreg program presents a linkage of two systems of innovation support services which exist parallel in each country (and are therefore hardly integrated). Chapter 4 concludes that the provision and use of innovation support services in cross-border regions face adaptation problems similar to transferring an innovation support service system to countries further away.Chapter 5 focuses on understanding how cross-border cooperation can be facilitated. The European Union fosters cooperation in cross-border regions through the European Cohesion Policy, but the development of according policy instruments requires a participatory approach in which stakeholders’ views are acknowledged. A prerequisite for a meaningful involvement of all stakeholders is an in-depth understanding of their viewpoints on what facilitates cross-border cooperation. Q methodology was used to identify and analyze stakeholders’ viewpoints about aspects that could facilitate cross-border cooperation. Four distinct viewpoints emerged: cooperation through (i) pro-active engagement, (ii) targeted policies, (iii) an aligned institutional setup, and (iv) socio-cultural proximity. Chapter 5 concludes that it is crucial to learn more about stakeholders’ experiences and viewpoints to increase their involvement in participatory approaches and thus reduce disparities and promote cohesion between the EU member states.Chapter 6 synthesizes the findings of Chapters 2 through 5. It discusses the perspective of entrepreneurs and other regional stakeholders on the role of language and culture, university linkages, institutional set-up and governance structure, the brokering and cross-border institutions in determining innovation. Chapter 6 concludes that culture, availability of brokers and a cross-border strategy influence enterprises’ business operations in cross-border regions but a facilitating role of university linkages does not seem to be immediately apparent at enterprise level. This thesis contributes to cross-border literature by (i) presenting opportunities and limitations of cross-border regional innovation systems at enterprise level, (ii) offering insight on cross-border influences in agri-food innovation processes, (iii) providing information to improve informed decision making in cross-border regions, and (iv) proposing ways to stimulate cross-border cooperation to facilitate agri-food innovation development.