Today, International Women’s Day 2022, European Commissioner  for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth Mariya Gabriel, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola and four other prominent women organized a roundtable discussion in the framework of the #EUWomen4Future campaign, which ended in March 2021. The campaign featured Dr. Andreja Kutnar, InnoRenew CoE director.

“Despite the hard times we are facing right now, we need to celebrate brave women and girls who have a crucial role in defending peace and democracy,” Commissioner Gabriel said in her welcoming remarks.

“We need to continue working towards gender equality in all fields of society, and not just today but every day. This is why today we are launching the new social media #SHEULeads as part of the European Year of Youth. This new initiative puts young women in the spotlight by inviting them to share their personal experience—successes and challenges, their missions, and how Europe has supported them in their journey.”

“Celebrating and raising awareness of women achievements in science and innovation, culture, education, youth and sport is extremely important because far too many women are made to feel inferior every day and days like this need to be used to send a strong message—we need to empower women to sit at the rightful seat at the table and the European Parliament is supporting this with its policies and concrete initiatives,” President Metsola added.

Today’s conversation also included Michaela Brchnelova, doctoral student at the Centre for Mathematical Plasma-Astrophysics in Leuven, Edilia Gänz, director of FEDORA – The European Circle of Philanthropists of Opera and Ballet, Maria Fátima Lucas, co-founder and CEO of Zymvol Biomodeling (a company developing computer-designed industrial enzymes by applying molecular modeling) and recipient of the Women Innovator 2020 award, Dr. Ana Proykova, research professor at the Faculty of Mathematics and Informatics at Sofia University, director of research at the Center for Excellence in ICT – UNITE and head of the Laboratory of High-Performance Computing in Sofia Tech Park.

During the conversation, these six women shared their life during the COVID-19 pandemic, professional achievements, thoughts about the EU’s work on gender equality and hopes for today’s girls and young women.

You can watch the roundtable discussion here.