On 15th September, the International Forum on Innovative Technologies and Management for Sustainability – 2022, organised by Kaunas University of Technology Panevėžys Faculty of Technology and Business (KTU PTVF) took place. This fourth Forum is one of the largest international events in terms of content and scope for the dissemination of research in Panevėžys city, providing an opportunity to attract researchers from different scientific fields and countries, as well as business and government representatives.
In the plenary session, the participants were welcomed by Prof. Dr. Daiva Žostautienė, Dean of KTU PTVF.
According to her, innovations do not come from nothing or from nowhere. “New ideas and the latest inventions come from old truths, so the main driver of innovation is knowledge, which must be constantly updated, reinterpreted and sometimes applied in an unconventional way in practice,” said the Dean.
She also pointed out that the fourth Forum is exceptional. “This year, due to the military conflict, we will not meet people from Russia and Ukraine. This situation shows once again how unstable the world is and how important sustainability is becoming”, said Žostautienė.
The participants were greeted by the Member of the Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania Deividas Labanavičius, the Deputy Mayor of Panevėžys Valdemaras Jakštas, the Chairman of the Council of the Faculty of Technology and Business of KTU Panevėžys, the Vice-President of the Lithuanian Confederation of Industrialists, the Chairman of the Board of the Lithuanian Confederation of Industrialists, UAB Metalistas Group, Mr. Mantas Gudas and Rimantas Serva, Director and Member of the Board of the Panevėžys Region Industrialists’ Association, expert of the Lithuanian Innovation Centre.
The main unifying theme of the Forum is sustainable development, which ensures people’s well-being in the present without compromising their future prosperity. The aim is to bring together Lithuanian and foreign researchers, practitioners and other stakeholders for academic dialogue, sharing of knowledge and experience, best practices, conceptual and empirical research results, experiments in the fields of technological and social sciences, addressing the challenges of innovative technologies and sustainable governance.
Dr Laszlo T. Koczy, Professor at Széchenyi István University and Budapest University of Technology and Economics, addressed the plenary. The guest from Hungary shared innovative solutions to mathematically assess the economic and environmental value at all stages of packaging development.
Professor Yevhen Baranchenko from the University of Northumbria (UK) gave a presentation on “The Third Mission of the University and Lithuania’s Response to the Refugee Crisis”. The aim of the presentation was to develop critical thinking and to form a correct attitude towards events such as war, the refugee crisis, etc.
The third plenary speaker, Rafael Robina Ramirez from the University of Extremadura in Spain, sought to highlight the challenges related to waste generated in the tourism industry.
After the plenary session, scientists from Lithuania and other countries presented papers and discussed at two conferences: the 14th International Scientific Conference “Intelligent Technologies in Logistics and Mechatronics Systems – ITELMS’2022” and the 9th International Scientific Conference “Changes in Social and Business Environment – CISABE’2022”.
The topics of the presentations covered two very different fields: technological and social sciences. This is why scientists not only discussed innovations in the biosensors industry, warfare, materials science, but also examined human psychological well-being in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.
