INU Council is pleased to support two new Seed Money Funding projects in 2026, which will deepen partnerships between INU member universities and enable new collaborative projects to develop between members. Each project receives £2,500 of INU funding to support the projects’ activities, which it is hoped will expand across the network in future as the projects grow.
The two funded projects are:
Global Fashion, Shared Futures
Project Partners: Kingston University (UK) and Parahyangan Catholic University (Indonesia)
Global Fashion, Shared Futures is a 12-month Phase 1 pilot designed to connect students, academic staff, and community/industry partners from Kingston University UK and Parahyangan Catholic University, Indonesia. The project uses sustainable fashion communication as an accessible, interdisciplinary context through which participants can examine how culture, ethics, consumption, entrepreneurship, and environmental responsibility intersect in different societies and across different stakeholders.
Regional and Global Value Chains between Europe and South America: Economic Policy Space, Strategic Inputs and Development Opportunities
Project Partners: Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Spain) and Universidad Nacional del Litoral (Argentina)
This project establishes a comparative international research network among INU member universities to investigate how integration into Global Value Chains (GVCs) and Regional Value Chains (RVCs) shapes the economic policy space available to countries and regions in Europe and South America, using Multi-Regional Input-Output (MRIO) modelling.
Project lead, Dr Hernan Roitbarg from Universidad Nacional del Litoral (Argentina) commented that “It is an honour to have been awarded the Seed Money Fund. This joint project with Dr Prof Maria Llop (Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Spain) highlights the importance of inter-territorial collaboration in addressing challenges related to productive integration across different regions of the world, particularly South America and Europe. I hope the project will help us better understand the changing global trade landscape and provide valuable insights to inform policymaking in our respective countries.”
We thank the colleagues leading these initiatives and look forward to seeing how the collaborations develop!