Between June and August 2026, the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration (FEBA) at Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski" hosted SINTACT secondees: Professor Shaofeng Liu (University of Plymouth), PhD candidate Sakunika Rathnayake (University of Colombo) and Dr. Tong Thi Minh Phuong (Vietnam National University, Hanoi).

Arriving at different points over the summer and from distinct research traditions, the three visitors shared a common interest in how transition processes affect the communities that live through them.

The host team designed a programme that deliberately cut across sectors. Meetings brought the visiting researchers into contact with university academics, non-governmental organisations, representatives of the Ministry of Energy, and companies working in the green transition. Each setting approached the same subject matter from a different professional vantage point.

Discussions covered the social dimensions of decarbonisation, energy poverty, the role of local communities, social innovation as a practical instrument, and the conditions for effective cooperation between research, public institutions, business and civil society.

Comparison ran through the entire programme. Questions that appear settled in one national context proved open in another, and the exchange between British, Sri Lankan, Vietnamese and Bulgarian perspectives gave each participant a sharper view of their own assumptions. This is the core rationale for transnational secondments: not the transfer of a single model, but the testing of ideas against unfamiliar conditions.

Weeks spent working in the same institution, conversations that continued past the agenda, and immersion in a different academic culture do work that remote collaboration cannot replicate. The visits created space for open dialogue across professional and cultural perspectives, and it is this that turns mobility into a process of joint learning rather than simply a visit.

The secondments laid the groundwork for joint research, future training activities and continued collaboration between the partner institutions. Staff exchanges under SINTACT continue over the coming project years.

The working discussions and meetings with different stakeholders confirmed that the green transition can only be sustainable if it is fair, inclusive and built with the participation of the people and communities it affects.

SINTACT is funded under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Staff Exchanges of the Horizon Europe programme, GA No 101234185.

As part of her secondment under SINTACT, Dr. Tong Thi Minh Phuong of the University of Economics and Business, Vietnam National University - Hanoi, presented a research seminar to PhD students and postdoctoral researchers at the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.

Her analysis, entitled "Economic Development, Renewable Energy, and CO₂ Emissions: A PMG-ARDL and Panel Threshold Analysis of ASEAN-6 and Balkan Countries", examines how economic growth and the expansion of renewable energy relate to carbon emissions across two regions at different stages of transition.

The comparative design speaks directly to the character of SINTACT, which brings together partners from Europe and Asia precisely in order to test whether transition patterns observed in one region hold in another.

The discussion that followed produced a number of recommendations for developing and extending the analysis, so that its findings feed more closely into the tasks of the project. Participants raised questions about the choice of indicators and the interpretation of the threshold effects, and the exchange will inform the next stage of the work.