Background

RLS-Sciences works under the framework of the Regional Leaders Summit. The Regional Leaders Summit (RLS) is a forum comprising seven regional governments (state, federal state, or provincial), which together represent approximately one hundred eighty million people across five continents, and a collective GDP of three trillion USD. The regions are: Bavaria (Germany), Georgia (USA), Québec (Canada), São Paulo (Brazil), Shandong (China), Upper Austria (Austria), and Western Cape (South Africa). Since 2002, the heads of government for these regions have met every two years for a political summit. These summits offer the RLS regions an opportunity for political dialogue. 

On April 12th, 2012, on the occasion of the Sixth Regional Leaders Summit in São Paulo, the RLS Member States adopted a Final Declaration which included the following commitment (Item 12):

''In order to increase the proportion of renewable energy in the total energy consumption, as well as contribute to the security of energy supply and to promote renewable energy on a global scale, we invite our universities, research institutes, and industrial clusters to join forces in the formation of a network, centered on renewable energy and energy efficiency, so that innovations and new products will be developed to achieve these goals. This initiative will be led by the Government of the State of São Paulo until 2014. The intensification of the cooperation in research is necessary to implement these technologies in renewable energy sources and energy efficiency broadly and at a reduced cost.''

(From left to right) São Paulo Governor Geraldo Alckmin, Secretary of Energy José Aníbal, and Undersecretary of Renewable Energies Milton Flávio Lautenschläger. Photo Credit: FAPESP

This was the impetus for the creation of the RLS-Energy Network. The RLS-Energy Network served as the pilot project for RLS-Sciences, which was established in 2016. Upon the establishment of RLS-Sciences, four themes- including energy- were identified as having the highest potential for cooperation. These were developed into four projects, which were embedded into the 8th RLS Conference in Munich. First, a scientific presentation of the Small Satellites project was made directly to the heads of government by project lead Prof. Dr. Klaus Schilling. Then, on the final day of the conference, each project was presented. Read more about the scientific activities and presentations from the 2016 RLS Conference here. In 2020, the fifth project, the RLS-Digital Health Initiative, began and was officially launched as the fifth project in 2022.

Previous Summits

The Regional Leaders have met twelve times in the framework of multilateral summits, beginning in 2002.

• The Bavarian Minister-President Dr. Edmund Stoiber hosted the first summit, held from January 30 to 31, 2002 in Munich, Germany, with the main topic of "Politics for Generations".
• The second summit with the main topics of "Youth" and "Technological Innovation" took place at the invitation of the Prime Minister of Québec, Jean Charest, in Québec, Canada from December 9 to 10, 2004.
• The third Regional Leaders Summit on invitation of Dr. Josef Pühringer, President of Upper Austria, took place in Linz, Austria, from July 11 to 12, 2006. Under the title "A sustainable future arising from a shared responsibility", the topics "Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency" and "Education and Youth" were discussed. The Brazilian federal state of São Paulo participated in this Summit for the first time.
  
• Following the invitation of the Governor of Shandong Province, Jiang Daming, the fourth Regional Leaders Summit took place in Jinan, China, from August 6 to 7, 2008. Topics of the fourth summit included "Resource-efficient society (energy and climate politics)" and "Public health care and provision". At this summit, the US state of Georgia was present for the first time as a partner region.
  
• On invitation of the Premier of the Western Cape, Helen Zille, the fifth Regional Leaders Summit took place in Cape Town, South Africa, from September 27 to 29, 2010. Topics of this summit were "Integrated Transport" and "Food Security".
  

sixth Regional Leaders Summit 2012 in São Paulo, Brazil

The sixth Regional Leaders Summit was held from April 11 to 12, 2012 in São Paulo, Brazil, on invitation of the Government of the State of São Paulo. The event was held on the topic of “Sustainable Energy and Development: the Role of Sub-National Entities”, which gave the regional leaders the opportunity to develop measures on issues of importance for each region. A milestone outcome of the meeting was the decision to launch a pilot project on Renewable Energies. This pilot project, launched in 2013 at the International Seminar on Biomass, Biogas and Energy Efficiency in São Paulo, has built the foundation for what has since grown into a strong multilateral science network with further research groups: the RLS-Sciences network. Following the cyclic pattern of the summits, the São Paulo Research Foundation FAPESP hosted the first RLS-Sciences Overall Conference in São José dos Campos in 2019.

Photo credit: FAPESP

SEVENTH REgional leader summit 2014 in Georgia, USA

For the seventh Regional Leaders Summit, the Governor of the State of Georgia invited the Partner Regions to Atlanta, USA, from June 2 to 3, 2014. In June 2014, the State of Georgia hosted the 7th Regional Leaders Summit in Atlanta. Under the main topic "Policy For Generations", the regional leaders discussed key issues such as global changes in logistics supply chains and the use of large-scale events to promote sustainable economic development. The exchange aimed to foster cross-regional understanding and maintain the continuity of previous Regional Leaders Summits.

Photo credit: Government of Georgia

Eighth REgional Leaders Summit 2016 in Bavaria, Germany

​The eighth Regional Leaders Summit was held in Munich at the invitation of Bavarian Minister-President Horst Seehofer, from July 14 to 15, 2016. The theme of the summit was "Digitalization and Innovation", and for the first time included presentations of RLS-Sciences projects to the political conference. This summit also marked the beginning of the "second round" of summits, as all regions had hosted.
To support collaboration in research and innovation across the regions in common areas of interest, three multilateral projects were established in addition to the pilot project named RLS-Energy Network that had been running since 2013: the RLS-Expert Dialogue on Digitization, the RLS-Global Aerospace Campus, and RLS-Small Satellites. Surrounding and during the conference, the Bavarian hosting team invited their regional partners to attend dedicated events for each of the RLS-Sciences themes. The four Bavarian project coordinators presented first outcomes to the regional leaders on the last conference day in the Munich Residenz .
During the event, opportunities were given to meet with representatives from multinational companies, as well as with students from each region participating in the Future Leaders’ Conference.

Photo credit: Bavarian State Government

Ninth Regional Leaders Summit 2018 in Québec, Canada

The ninth summit was held in Québec, Canada, at the invitation of Québec Premier Philippe Couillard from 17-18 May, 2018. The theme was ''Energy Transition: Towards a low carbon economy''. Each region shared best practices, energy policies and diverse knowledge to address the challenge of climate change.
Surrounding and during the conference, RLS-Sciences partners held events for each of the four thematic projects and provided updates on their respective developments to the regional leaders. As part of the political program, the RLS-Energy Network highlighted the strengths of the RLS regions in renewable energy research to the regional leaders. The program also featured the presentation of one of the network’s most recent outputs, the RRA Monitoring Report. You can find the report here: https://www.rls-sciences.org/energy1.html

Tenth regional leaders Summmit 2021, Linz and virtually

The tenth summit was held virtually and in Linz at the invitation of Upper Austria Governor Thomas Stelzer on 11 November, 2021. Under the overall theme “Smart Region”, partners exchanged on opportunities and learnings in the respective regions and created a multilateral best practice collection.
In addition to the smart region dialogue, the summit showcased the work of the RLS-Sciences network. Building on a joint exchange of politics and science in 2020 on the topic of COVID-19, a new multilateral scientific project, the Digital Health Initiative, was presented on the initiative of Bavaria.
Furthermore, Dr. Florence Gauzy, RLS-Sciences Lead Management in Munich, and Dr. Sebastian Goers, then-president of RLS-Sciences, provided insights into the network’s successes and upcoming activities.
Another highlight of the summit’s program was the signing of the joint final declaration by the regional leaders, committing to further cooperation and improving the future viability of the regions with smart projects.

Eleventh Regional Leaders Summit 2023 in shandong, China

The eleventh summit was held at the invitation of the Governor of Shandong Province Zhou Naixiang from 25-26 September, 2023 on the topic "Green Development".
During the event, Shandong Scientific Coordinator Prof. Yang Hetong presented RLS-Sciences to the political representatives. He highlighted the outcomes of the 2023 RLS-Sciences Digital Week, which Shandong co-hosted, as well as the series of scientific activities organized by Shandong as follow-up to the Digital Week.

Twelfth Regional Leaders Summit 2025 in Western Cape, South Africa

The 12th Regional Leaders Summit (RLS) took place from 3-5 November, 2025, in Cape Town under the theme “Growth through Economic Resilience“. At the invitation of the Western Cape government, delegations from all seven RLS regions attended the summit, engaging in bi- and multilateral exchanges.
During the closing session, Western Cape handed over the hosting of RLS to São Paulo for 2027. Please find the Western Cape governmental statement here.

Photo Credit: Bavarian State Chancellery, via LinkedIn