| Innovation Days and Knowledge Forums were organized in 2001, 2002, and 2003 to follow the Global Development Marketplace. Their purpose: to award grants to projects designed by citizens and local groups that build local development capacity, expertise, networking, and citizens’ empowerment.
The projects chosen to receive grants were determined on a competitive basis, and the event itself was combined with the Knowledge Forum whereby knowledge, experiences, and best practices were exchanged between participants from Ukraine, Belarus, and Moldova. The first Innovation Day (ID) event in June 2001 attracted more than 460 brief proposals out of which 15 were awarded grants. The 2002 Knowledge Forum centered on the Distant Learning Course “Social Partnership –A Paradigm for Success”. It was a three-country event (Ukraine, Moldova, and Belarus), which attracted 45 NGO activists and 15 government officials as participants, and a total of 65 people took part in the Knowledge Forum, in which the participants presented their case studies.
These events have provided NGOs in the region with important opportunities to develop their networks and learn from others. Furthermore, the Decentralized Development Marketplace (DDM)–2003 forum allowed participants from Ukraine, Belarus, and Moldova to compete for start-up funding for new and creative development ideas. A key objective of the DDM-2003 was the use of a decentralized approach to promoting innovation within the World Bank Group. Emphasis was placed on encouraging innovation that was consistent with the respective development priorities of the three countries and the DDM-03 received more than 620 submissions for the single nomination and 35 proposals for the special “Three Countries – One Team” nomination
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