my name is rahan mukal and I'm director of creative economy at the British Council and I'm based in our office in London The Forum is part of uh the spotlight season that we have running at the moment there is a spotlight on France um as a result of the Olympics and the par Olympics and alongside that spirit that Olympic Spirit uh we have this opportunity to really reignite and reimagine the relationship uh postco uh with uh France The Forum sits within that whole portfolio a portfolio of nearly 50 projects that are happening across France that is also something that we are doing is really trying to get out into the regions and out into the towns and trying to get culture something that people gravitate towards and enjoy and are part of so this forum comes at a really special moment um alongside that I'm going to be chairing uh moderating a panel at The Forum which I'm really delighted to do um and on my panel I have um the CEO of creative UK Caroline norbury and then also on my panel I have uh Professor Andy Pratt who is the UNESCO uh chair for Creative global creative economy um and then I also have James Bennett um and he is the director of a project called co-star what I'm really hoping is that the conversation um will be a catalyst uh for inspiring and new ways of thinking but also for a contemporary understanding of the diversity of creative approaches that we have in the UK and I hope that the the diversity will connect with the diversity you have here in France when creative people come together in unexpected spaces um magic can happen the adversity and the uncertainty um of the co pandemic and what came after it um has fueled um our creatives to to imagine better um and to think about a future which is much more inclusive um and fairer um and I think artists are some of the best documenters in society their ability to look at the world differently and to imagine something different is essential I think for a creative sector to thrive I'm Caroline no I'm the chief executive of creative UK creative UK does two things um we champion and Advocate uh the for the creative Industries in the UK um but we also work directly with lots and lots of small creative businesses to help them grow and to help them get the investment that they need to grow I've been invited here to speak about the work that creative UK does to today's Forum um it's really interesting to meet um different organizations uh that are engaged in the creative economy in France I think that the the fusion of of of culture and commerciality in the UK makes it quite easy for people from other countries to to engage because you're not waiting on the permission of an official body or um or a particular structure you know it's it's very much around uh getting access to the different networks and and when you do that you find an openness um and a desire to collaborate one of the reasons that you know I'm very keen to collaborate with British Council is because I think that fundamentally the British Council is about building World Peace it's about getting people in a room to share their own experiences of culture talk about their own experiences and and then together learn more about each other and find a way in which we can live in a in a world that's a bit more harmonious and you know we you can't get enough of that at the moment and the more that you talk and the more that you share the more that you can build those um you can build those bonds that uh that build a picture of togetherness rather than otherness I'm Professor James Bennett I'm the director of the costar National Lab for R&D in the creative Industries CoStar is the national R&D lab for Creative Industries support companies working with Innovative new technologies from artificial intelligence to 5G to virtual production allowing companies to explore and experiment with those Technologies supported by researchers to build and innovate new products services and experiences that they wouldn't be able to do alone British Council invited me to come and speak about CoStar at The Forum I think what was fantastic about the panel was the opportunity to think about ecosystems internationally and nationally and how the opportunity to plug some of those connections together is really important for developing companies and cultural experiences that have a chance to grow collaboration is so key to Innovation the worst thing for Innovation is a silo so if the UK sits in a silo we'll only ever innovate for ourselves we have to think internationally and France is our nearest neighbor so for us I think one of the exciting things out of the panel was thinking about where France and the UK can connect on Innovation opportunities that challenge some of our established business Norms that provide opportunities where generative AI in particular is not a threat but an opportunity my name is Andy Pratt I'm professor of creative economy um at City University in London um but also I hold the role of UNESCO chair in Creative global creative economy I do research projects on the creative economy particularly um cross National um um work one of the projects that I've also been working on recently is the Circ project project uh which is looking at Creative Impact in research in Europe one of the dimensions that we were looking at that in the research lab in London was about creative diversity um and we've been interested in trying to understand the contribution that creative diversity makes to creative growth one of the challenges to uh um supporting diversity is supporting the possibility of getting a job in the creative sector so actually investment in Mak making those jobs more permanent and secure careers Etc are things that a variety of uh of Institutions can do one of the um big challenges is that cultural activities tend to spill over into areas like Health and Welfare um in terms of uh transport even in term Urban Regeneration all these different areas um and uh actually connecting them up um is a real problem um so rather than culture just being used used as like the cherry on the cake as an instrumental sort of gain for other activities to actually hold on to the intrinsic value of culture and creative activities and have that driving um the direction is one of the big challenges both in terms of urban policym but also in terms of national policymaking for the cultural economy