On the 15th February, the Euro-Mediterranean Economists Association held the workshop Mind-body Approaches to Boost Brain Capital in Sant Pau Recinte Modernista, EMEA HQs, as part of the BioRegion Health Innovation Week organized by BioCat.
The workshop was divided into two sessions: one dealing with creativity and exercise as boosters of brain capital as separate concepts, and another identifying the intersections between creativity and exercise and the effects on brain health and skills.
These topics brought together a wide variety of speakers calling in from many regions across the globe and the Mental Health Cluster (MHC) was one of them.
MHC, a social innovation hub
As a key note speaker of this event, our cluster manager Marta Sànchez Bret presented the MHC initiative within the economic framework in which the EMEA is currently engaged, and more specifically, within the Brain Capital Alliance Programme.
The MHC initiative certainly made an impact among the attendees. We are the only cluster in the world that connects the drive for competitiveness across the mental health, neuro and silver economy markets with innovation, drawing a holistic and multidisciplinary user-centred perspective. Social innovation based on products and services that provide the best bio-psycho-social environment for individuals, allowing them to develop their fullest autonomy.
The emerging brain economy
Moderator of the event, Theo Edmonds, Founder at the Imaginator Academy said that “as the focus on environmental determinants of human health and economic systems grows, interest in creativity as a driver of workforce productivity and enterprise innovation is growing concurrently. By developing a creativity infrastructure within the emerging brain economy, companies have exponential opportunities for collaboration and commerce through the lens of human flourishing. The growing importance of stakeholder capitalism heightens the stakes even further. Strengthening our understanding of the mind-body connection in the cultural value chain of innovation has never been more important.”
Prof. Rym Ayadi, President and Founder of the Euro-Mediterranean Economists Association closed the workshop highlighting that we need innovative daring transformative approaches that link mind and body to enhance our brain capital in order to face growing societal challenges.
The workshop, an opportunity to envision how collaboration between the MHC and the Brain Capital Alliance can yield very positive results, was held in collaboration with Brain Capital Alliance, OECD Neuroscience-inspired Policy Initiative, Center for Health and Bioscience at The Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University, University of Colorado Denver’s Imaginator Academy, and European Brain Council.
We look forward to meeting again in further international sessions.
