october 2013 | 7NATIONAL

Bottom-up innovation in Maastricht Library law secures accessTHE HJAGUE | In response to a proposal by the minister of education, culture and science, Jet Bussemaker (PvdA), the cabinet has approved a bill that will make the public library system more cohesive. The law ensures, for instance, that members of the public will still have access to a library should their local branch close. Municipalities wishing to close their library must make arrangements with neighbouring coun-cils so that readers can borrow books there instead. The new law also gives the National Library (KB) a central and coordinating role in the library network.

Fracking ban extendedAMSTERDAM | The Ministry of Economic Affairs has announced that the existing moratorium on fracking for shale gas in the Netherlands will be extended for at least a year. Minister Henk Kamp (VVD) publically admitted that the unrest in Dutch society was too big to continue his fracking plans for now. In the three Dutch municipalities where test drills by British exploration company Cuadrilla were planned, local groups have been actively protesting against fracking for years with the support of Friends of the Earth (Milieudefensie). In the last few months, they did this together with municipality officials local politicians.

Regional weight differencesTHE HAGUE | Figures releases by Statis-tics Netherlands point to large differ-ences in levels of weight, smoking and drinking habits between regions. With 38, 41, 45 and 45 percent respectively, the GGD regions of Utrecht, Amster-dam, Gooi & Vechtstreek and Regio Ni-jmegen have the lowest percentages of overweight adults. The highest percent-ages of overweight adults are found in the GGD regions of Zuid-Holland Zuid, Twente, Drenthe and Zuid-Limburg. There appears to be an obvious relation between weight and education.

NL supports Ghana portsACCRA | The government of the Neth-erlands seeks to support Ghana’s plan to expand and develop its sea ports to meet the needs of growing imports and exports, according to Dutch Ambas-sador Hans Docter. “We are both the gateways to our backyard region, so it is important to develop our ports to support trade in our respective regions,” the ambassador explained. With about 100 companies operating in the West African country, the Netherlands is one of the top 10 FDI sources in Ghana, according to the Ghana Investments Promotion Center (GIPC).

Most people would consider a train ride from Maastricht to Amsterdam and back, on the same day, rather boring.

But not for the brand new team of TEDxMaastricht who, together with SocialCoupé and NS, decided to focus on the journey and not the destina-tion and called speakers on a coach, before or instead of stepping on stage. BrainTrain, a side event that featured 32 TED talks on two days on an In-tercity coach and engaged dozens of unsuspecting passengers, was the first but probably not last of its kind.

Simple idea – just as simple as the contribution that is expected from everyone when the world’s popula-tion will count “9 Billion and You.” And the speakers go into details. We will have to talk, cooperate and share, and we might even have to eat bugs or cultured meat. Still, “the glass is full, with air and water,” Gunter Pauli, author of The Blue Economy tell us, while sword swallower Dan Meyer assures us that impossible is not im-possible. All will have to find innova-tive ways to their existence, and this is the idea TEDxMaastricht wants to spread in the local community.

But the city’s breeding of innova-tion goes even further: a new genera-tion of entrepreneurs are taking its startup scene to the next stage. “Four years ago, we only had a short list of ventures that got attention – now it’s becoming longer and making more

of an impact,” says Wynand Bodewes, leader of the Maastricht Center for Entrepreneurship at Maastricht Uni-versity. MC4E, as they call it, plays a key role in nurturing entrepreneurial talent and helping companies work out their business ideas through courses and bootcamps.

“Maastricht has the unique feature of being so close to other markets, in Germany and Belgium,” says Ana Mihail, coordinator of the startup programs. “So it can be a good place for new startups to launch in three countries and test their products and services.” Students can also learn that, although of a smaller scale, invest-ment is at hand in the form of the university’s resources as well as angel investors.

Furthermore, the successes of local entrepreneurs can be the strongest in-spiration for up-and-comers.

Some have already taken off from here. The likes of custom implant maker Xilloc, customisable e-learning tool StudyTube, online privacy spe-cialist BlueVPN or anti-spam spe-cialist SpamExperts are just some of the examples that can be cited as of Maastricht origin. Recently, a green tech company called Nerdalize joined the list, successfully closing a crowd-funding round of 50,000 euro to fol-low up on a professional investment that resulted from a Startup Pirates Maastricht bootcamp earlier this year. They are now busy with building a

prototype and getting ready to bring the product to market.

“If you want to operate interna-tionally, Maastricht region is really good for setting up a business,” says Luuk van der Baaren, who’s following the footsteps of Nerdalize as winner of the latest bootcamp. While still studying at the university, van der Baaren wanted to find an affordable and accessible alternative to lawsuits and mediation. He figured that an on-line tool that guides users through the process of negotiating would increase people’s chances to solve the prob-lems themselves. He is now working on building his team and conducting research to develop the product.

Despite a definitely promising tal-ent pool of entrepreneurial minds, the challenge for Maastricht remains to convince innovative ventures to stay. “We are working on an incubator pro-gram, to be launched next year, with a strong emphasis on support and coaching,” Bodewes remarks.

Meanwhile, it seems that there is a strong intent in the region for so-cial entrepreneurship. Contrary to the fast-growing tech startups, these focus on the problems local communities face and aim to find a solution that is also financially sustainable. Seeing the demand, MC4E incorporated a so-cial edition to the original Startup Pi-rates bootcamp format (of Portuguese origin and already spread to seven countries) to its Social Entrepreneur-

ship Summer School in August. And it turned out the Dutch can inspire more than one continent.

“The Netherlands is ahead of the other countries in terms of social entrepreneurship, and I can now implement new ideas in the project I am working on,” explains Fabianna Minekawa as to why she embarked on a trip like this from Brazil. The company that she works for, Ibrati-tude, a social responsibility branch of Bestway Group, provides a privately financed computer literacy program for underprivileged teenagers in Sao Paolo, and already has about 5,000 graduates.

But the judges of the programme, Niek Karsmakers of Aim For The Moon and Sheila Oroschin of The Masters, were most impressed by the idea for a social venture presented by Ghanese Yaa Afrakomah Saprong. She is convinced educating and sup-plying young women with oral con-traceptives could be a long-term solu-tion to the problems of large families living in the rural areas of Ghana who can not support their children properly.

The young entrepreneur is cur-rently looking for financial resources for her venture Ololo Contraceptives, the sustainibility of which would come from the moderate profits of the pills sold. “By helping with family planning”, says Yaa, “we create tools against poverty.”

Entrepreneurship is key for economic growth and the Maastricht region has many ideas to explore. ANIKO JORI-MOLNAR takes a look at how a strong startup scene is being built and how innovation is taking over.

Photo: Aad van Vliet

Image: Joe 13