KijaniSpace (GreenSpace in Swahili) is a highly innovative initiative built on the foundation of previous successful AU-EU collaborations and partnerships in the fields of space, IoT, climate and agriculture. The vision of the project is to extend the use of Copernicus Earth observation data for the application of climate-smart agriculture in Africa to regional research and innovation development. To enhance the use of Copernicus data by local African stakeholders, we have proposed several practical but innovative approaches. First of all, Copernicus data should be integrated into the local IoT dataset to enhance the local context, users and market needs of the application. Therefore, the project proposed to develop a Space-IoT Solution Box (called KijaniBox, GreenBox in Swahili ) that integrates the existing platform, tools and dataset for simplified local availability and accessibility. Using the KijaniBox EO and IoT resources, the project will launch two programs, one called Training Program for skills development and creation of minimum viable products and another Innovation Program for SMS innovation experiments. In addition, the project will conduct the pilot demonstration of two agricultural applications (crop farming and fish farming). Finally, the project will engage the various local and international stakeholders and actors with a multi-stakeholder approach to co-create innovation and collaboration environments. KijaniBox is a highly innovation-oriented consortium composed of thirteen (13) companies, six European and seven African partners from seven (7) different countries. The concept of the KijaniSpace project is being piloted in the Great Lake Victoria basin region. The ultimate aim of KijaniSpace is to pave the way for long-term sustainable economic growth and green job creation in Africa and Europe through Copernius and IoT.

PoliVisu is a Research and Innovation project designed to evolve the traditional public policy making cycle using big data. The aim is to enhance an open set of digital tools to leverage data to help public sector decision-making become more democratic by (a) experimenting with different policy options through impact visualisation and (b) using the resulting visualisations to engage and harness the collective intelligence of policy stakeholders for collaborative solution development. Working with three cities to address societal problems linked to smart mobility and urban planning, the intention is to enable public administrations to respond to urban challenges by enriching the policy making process with opportunities for policy experimentation at three different steps of the policy cycle (policy design, policy implementation, and policy evaluation). Experimentation of policy options will enable the cities to tackle complex, systemic policy problems that require innovative thinking to develop transformative solutions.

The NextGEOSS project will implement a federated data hub for access and exploitation of Earth Observation data, including user-friendly tools for data mining, discovery, access and exploitation. This data hub will be supported by a strong commitment to the engagement of Earth Observation and related communities, with the view of supporting the creation of innovative and business oriented applications. The main general objectives for NextGEOSS are to 1) Deliver the next generation data hub and Earth Observation exploitation for innovation and business; 2) Engage communities, promoting innovative GEOSS powered applications from Europe; and 3) Advocate GEOSS as a sustainable European approach for Earth Observation data distribution and exploitation. NextGEOSS engages main providers of Earth Observation data, including Copernicus Collaborative Ground Segments and Core Services. While continuing to support the GEO-DAB and OpenSearch as the middleware components in charge of interconnecting the heterogeneous and d