The project is led by Food & Bio Cluster Denmark, which is a leading European cluster within the entire food and bioeconomy value chain, running the secretariat for the Innovation Network for Bioresources – one of the largest of its kind in the world, and the Danish Food Innovation Network on behalf of the Danish Ministry of Education and Research. FBCD is a full member of the Biobased Industries Consortium (BIC) and has many years of experience in developing projects to support the growth of innovative SMEs in the bioeconomy and developing new projects along the value chain. The organisation was also a founder member of the European Commission’s Enterprise Europe Network, a business and innovation support network comprising around 3000 personnel in 60+ offices in 60+ countries in the world, including key Asian markets. Under the EEN contract, FBCD has been a mentor to Asian EEN offices for six years and has an impressive track record for over a decade as the top performing office in terms of helping SMEs operate cross-border. A senior staff member of FBCD is based in Bangkok, covering China and South East Asian markets for the cluster and member companies.
Cluster FOOD+i association, established in 2009, is a non-profit organisation that manages the food industry cluster of the Ebro Valley region (NE Spain), which is a strategic business hub in Spain. This region is among the most productive agricultural areas in Southern Europe, containing 25.2% of Spanish food companies, reaching an annual turnover of 29,362 M€ (35.67 of total). The organisation is recognised as an “Innovative Business Group” by the Spanish Ministry for Industry, Tourism and Trade and currently, interacts regularly with an ecosystem formed by more than 250 food companies. FOOD+I is also actively involved in the development of the bioeconomy sector in the agrifood sector within the Ebro Valley Region (Spain and is a full member of the Bio-based Industries Consortium (BIC).
Foodvalley NL is a non-profit agrifood innovation cluster based in Wageningen, the Netherlands, founded in 2004 as one of the first agrifood innovation clusters. The organisation consists of ca. 25 employees with various backgrounds and areas of expertise related to agriculture or food. FVNL has a network of over 200 companies and keeps close ties to prominent knowledge institutes, including Wageningen University and Research (WUR), one of the leading universities worldwide in agrifood. FVNL focuses on three main innovation themes within the agrifood domain, including protein shift, food & health and circular agrifood, including all related technologies. In November 2020 it was announced Foodvalley NL will be the leading European Hub in a new, worldwide network of Food Innovation Hubs that are being catalysed and supported in Africa, Latin America, and Asia by the World Economic Forum (WEF) and several global and regional partners. In collaboration with other European agrifood clusters, FVNL has organised numerous missions to explore the Chinese, Brazilian, Canadian, and American markets with a large group of flagship agrifood-SMEs.
VITAGORA is an agrifood innovation cluster and since its beginnings in 2005, has built a network of 550 industry and research professionals, among which more than half are SMEs, covering the whole agri-food value chain. In December 2015, VITAGORA was awarded the Gold Label of Cluster Management Excellence, which was renewed in 2017. In July 2016, the city of Dijon, with the strong involvement of VITAGORA, received the FoodTech label by the French government, acknowledging the commitment and dynamic of its ecosystem to support start-ups in the area (FoodScience, FoodService, AgTech, Retail, etc.).
Flanders’ FOOD (FF) is a cluster organisation, awarded with the European Cluster Excellence Initiative Gold label, and the spearhead cluster for the agri-food industry in Flanders. Flanders’ FOOD has about 300 company members – about 70% SMEs and 30% large industry and collaborates with all the relevant RTOs and innovation actors in Flanders. Flanders’ FOOD focuses on the economic growth of the Flemish agri-food industry, acting mainly as an enabler for innovation and integrator to create a trust zone of open innovation with all stakeholders in the agri-food business complex.
ITC – Innovation Technology Cluster Murska Sobota (ITC) is a non-profit business support organisation located in the North- Eastern part of Slovenia, bordering Austria, Hungary, and Croatia. The cluster was established in 2011 as the Institute of Advanced Technologies and Communications, extending the scope of work to rural development, food innovation and protection of environment. ITC vision is to foster cross-sectoral innovation based upon novel technologies and ICT, while bringing together SMEs and other institutions from different sectors and turn them into being ‘’Smart’’, thus creating an unique Europe wide eco-system focused into areas of Smart farming, Smart living, Smart villages, Smart cities, Smart water, Smart tourism and others. ITC cluster is a founder and main administration office of the European Digital Innovation Hub – DIH AGRIFOOD, bringing together Slovenian and European research and development expertise in the field of agriculture, food production & processing and food supply. DIH AGRIFOOD membership includes more than 800 organisations.
Formed by a group of Catalan companies in 2012, Packaging Cluster (ACP) has now more than 100 active members including companies, knowledge centres and entities representing the entire value chain of the field, which range from RTD, raw materials and intermediates, machinery, peripheral equipment and services, packaging manufacturers and end users. Notably, the Packaging Cluster has the support of all the administrations, working closely with them to impact heavily on the overall economy and is recognised with several awards. The entity is integrated into the Program Catalonia Clusters ACCIÓ, is a cluster registered as Innovative Business Association (AEI) by the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism and received the European qualification gold cluster management by the European Cluster Excellence Initiative (ECIS).
