Smart Specialisation strategies in North Africa: a catching-up strategy for less-developed countries - the case of Tunisia

The European Union Cohesion Policy lies on a variety of policy instruments including Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialisation (RIS3) on a regional level. Despite its proximity to Europe, there is currently no strategy of its own for North Africa, only a strategy-building process. Since Smart Specialisation claims to address regional disparities by initiating catch-up processes and exploiting endogenous growth potential, the concept is particularly promising for less-developed regions. The authors present five steps to define priority sectors for the development of a Smart Specialisation strategy for the country of Tunisia, using the regions of Sfax and Medenine as an example. These steps involve regional qualitative and quantitative assessment, trend analysis and an analysis of sectoral internationalisation potential. The findings align with previous work and contribute to the discussion about Smart Specialisation on the African continent.