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Given that EU have recently signed a Copernicus agreement with Chilean Government, EARSC would like to leverage on it and will work with stakeholders in the region to initiate discussions on future collaborations. There are so many actors in Chile and big enthusiasm around Copernicus however I think they still search for the next step to take this National strategy forward since they need to find a good level of political support. There is a strong academic/university interest, but there are also industrial foundations such as EuroChile which could help rally the various interests and provide a lever for growth on the back of Copernicus as part of the Copernicus Relays. During these days I met around 25 stakeholders from private and public side, in fact I was very happy with the organization of BBB/EuroChile as they were the chairs who created such an excellent platform and environment to meet and chat with cooperation partners. Thank you Eurochambers / Eurochile colleagues for such a great jobfor giving us the opportunity to participate in FIDAE!

One strong message that came out was about awareness. Quite a few of the stakeholders attending the event wondered where they could get data from Copernicus, is that easy to download from the cloud, what type of processing could be done with it? how we could be more engaged? So what EC called “the network of Copernicus ambassadors: the Copernicus Relays” will have big opportunities for awareness campaigns; coordinating and promoting activities around the programme, its benefits, and opportunities for local residents and businesses. Reflecting on this afterwards with another expert, we discussed the value-adding community is the best target to be involved in those campaigns as they really know the final users.

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