About the Project
Balkan-Med project aims at establishing transnational agri-food cooperation links among agri-food businesses and research institutions, promoting at the same time technology transfer and food innovation in order to facilitate the upgrade of the competitiveness and extroversion of agri-food SMEs.
The FOCUS mission is to advance the capacity & competitiveness of small medium enterprises (SMEs) in order to deliver innovative, novel and improved food products for national, regional and global markets.
FOCUS project aims at establishing transnational agri-food cooperation links among agri-food businesses and research institutions, promoting at the same time technology transfer and food innovation in order to facilitate the upgrade of the competitiveness and extroversion of agri-food SMEs.
FOCUS objective is to advance the capacity & competitiveness of SMEs in order to deliver innovative, novel & improved food products for national, regional & global markets. This will be achieved through implementing a robust set of activities accelerating “Triple Helix” collaboration resulting to innovation & technology transfer in the agri-food sector, exchange of experiences and analysis of good practices in the field. More specifically, FOCUS aims at:
- Establishing transnational Balkan-Med Agri-food Clusters of Excellence that will offer a consolidated mix of transnational activities: FOCUS Clusters, properly designed and operating under a coordinated manner, common defined objectives and plans of action, will foster linkages, collaborations & exchange among technology providers, agribusinesses, food SMEs, large enterprises, business support organizations, policy makers and academia, focusing on the competitiveness of SMEs.
- Advancing existing knowledge & capacity of Agri-food SMEs & enhance R&I competencies developing market driven solutions & products: The project will increase the access of SMEs to technology & market intelligence, consulting support, capacity building & services towards adopting new business models, novel technologies & introducing market driven innovative products in Balkan-Med.
- Integrating smart growth, resource efficiency, sustainable production & healthy food products concept in the policy framework: FOCUS will demonstrate at policy level that new technologies can generate positive externalities & help industry align with regulations & market pressures.
- Organising dissemination activities that will promote the food sector as the one with the greatest market growth opportunities: The project will optimise knowledge transfer & keep together the widest cross-section of researchers & other stakeholders to recognize the most important challenges and address R&I in new market trends.
FOCUS Anticipated Results
Fostering transnational cooperation links among all relevant 4Helix actors (Industry – Academia – Public – Civil society) of Agri-food Industry under the operation of Balkan-Med Agri-food Clusters of Excellence.
Enhancing profitability and growth performance of Agri-food SMEs by combining and transferring new and existing knowledge into innovative and competitive solutions seizing Balkan-Med business and market opportunities.
Improvement of capacity, competitiveness and extroversion of SMEs supporting them identify new business models, technologies and innovation through Innovative Clusters and support services.
Improvement of the capacity of clusters’ key actors.
Market uptake and distribution of innovations.
Support a successful and competitive pan-Balkan-Med agri-food industry.
Contribution to targets of EU2020 Strategy towards inclusive, smart and sustainable growth and Regional Polices and RIS3.
Target groups
- Agrifood SMEs
- Startups
- Academia/ Research institutions
- Business Support Organisations
- Civil Society
- Policy makers
- Large firms
