The Smart Specialisation (S3) process in North Macedonia started in March 2018, when the letter of commitment from the country's government on starting the development of the National Research and Innovation Strategy for Smart Specialisation (RIS3) reached the JRC. At the same time, an inter-institutional working body was formed, consisting of the representatives from the government, relevant ministries and academic community (S3 working group). The JRC was asked to support the process of development of the smart specialisation strategy. North Macedonia intends to adopt its RIS3 in late 2020 or early 2021 by thoroughly following the JRC methodological framework for smart specialisation in the EU enlargement and neighbourhood countries (JRC S3 Framework).

Members of the North Macedonia’s S3 working group have undergone training on S3 process in Ljubljana, Slovenia, in April 2018. Apart from participating at the training, the country's S3 team agreed on the next steps of the Roadmap to RIS3. The follow-up to the abovementioned training was organised in Brussels, Belgium, in November 2018, as a workshop with active participation of the country's S3 working group in all steps foreseen under the JRC S3 framework.

Participation in these activities enabled the country's S3 team to take on the first steps of the S3 process and to engage the analytical team within the working group to prepare the data for the analysis of economic, scientific and innovative potential. In order to raise awareness on the smart specialisation process in the country, the S3 team of North Macedonia organised a two-day expert workshop on smart specialisation in the capital of Skopje in February 2019, with the support of the TAIEX instrument and under JRC guidance. At this event, experts presented all phases of the S3 process under the JRC S3 framework, with the focus on key elements and challenges for conducting successful mapping exercise and EDP phase. The country's progress in accordance with the S3 roadmap has been reassessed and provisional dates for all phases have been laid down. The country is currently in the process of finalising the set of strategic documents related to the S3 process.

The dialogue with a wide group of stakeholders within the entrepreneurial discovery process is going to take place after the completion of the analysis of country's economic, scientific and innovative potential. It is provisionally scheduled to start in early 2020.

Expert assessment of R&I system and policies of North Macedonia undertaken in October 2019 is given below:

Note: Scores for each of the 16 sub-dimensions are on a scale from 0-5; 0 = no information available
Source: Country expert evaluation workshop, 2019  

North Macedonia is committed to carrying out the smart specialisation process under the JRC S3 Framework. The country's S3 roadmap is closely followed and the country is achieving progress. It is necessary to:

- maintain full commitment and devotion to the S3 process;

- provide validity to the S3 priority domain selection by consulting wide base of stakeholders in the entrepreneurial discovery process;

- enhance capacities for monitoring, evaluation and implementation stages of the upcoming RIS3.