Collaborative Advancement for Renewed Education, Generation, Economy and Technology Transition
CARE-GET project envisions a future where health, wellness, technology and nature approaches harmonise to create a vibrant and sustainable urban life.
CARE-GET project envisions a future where health, wellness, technology and nature approaches harmonise to create a vibrant and sustainable urban life. The project mission is to tackle the challenge of harnessing talent in shrinking cities while improving medical services and fostering the local job market. The municipality of Haskovo aims to leverage its existing cultural, educational and economic assets to propose an innovative MedTech Hub, harnessing talents to resolve skills gaps, long-term youth unemployment, brain drain and lack of job possibilities for young employees. CARE-GET project harnesses the power of the existing medical sector to provide holistic services and educational opportunities. The project initiates awareness, disseminates knowledge and elevates skills in the sphere of well-being and health prevention. The project supports the municipality in its transition toward a sustainable local economy driven by the digital and medical sector, being able to generate new jobs, with young talents to grow and produce added value in the local market. CARE-GET's commitment is not just nurturing innovations and startups but also enriching the talent behind them. The project off ers attractive workplaces for modern, alternative and advanced healthcare services in a fl amboyant environment melting nature and heritage. CARE-GET is pioneering a holistic ecosystem around the innovative MedTech Hub that attracts, nurtures, and retains talent. CARE-GET addresses one of the most complex challenges faced by shrinking cities: how to retain and attract talent while transforming local economic and social systems. In Haskovo, population decline, youth unemployment, brain drain, workforce shortages and skills mismatches are closely connected to the capacity of the local economy to generate attractive employment and future-oriented opportunities. CARE-GET responds by developing an integrated ecosystem around health, MedTech, digital technologies, education, innovation, entrepreneurship and wellbeing. At the centre of this ecosystem is the development of a MedTech Hub Haskovo, conceived not simply as a physical facility, but as a platform connecting healthcare providers, educational institutions, businesses, entrepreneurs, public authorities and local communities. The Hub combines professional development, innovative healthcare services, digitalisation, telemedicine, entrepreneurship and community-oriented activities. The project builds this ecosystem through a sequence that connects evidence, skills, collaboration, innovation and implementation. Labour-market and skills-gap analysis provides the evidence base; new training and curricula respond to identified needs; interdisciplinary and intergenerational programmes test these solutions with different user groups; and entrepreneurship and innovation mechanisms connect skills and knowledge with new economic opportunities. CARE-GET therefore approaches talent development as part of a wider local economic transition, aiming to create the conditions for young people and professionals to develop, work, innovate and build new opportunities locally.
