UNESCO's University-Industry Partnerships (UNISPAR)

UNESCO’s University-Industry-Science Partnership (UNISPAR) program was launched in 1993 to improve the quality of universities in developing countries and encourage them to become more involved in the process of industrialization of their country.

Since 2002, UNISPAR has focused on capacity-building and technical assistance in the governance of science and technology parks. The expected results are:

1. stronger partnerships and linkages between universities and industry, including small and medium-sized enterprises, to promote innovation, engineering education, North-South cooperation, gender mainstreaming, maintenance and related areas for technological development.
2. development of human resources, including the training of engineers in the transfer of research results, maintenance of equipment and related areas.
3. stronger networking of technology for development, sponsored by industry with UNESCO support.

To this end, UNESCO’s works in close cooperation with the international professional organizations in this field. These include the World Technopolis Association (WTA) and the International Association of Science Parks (IASP).