El Packaging Cluster faces the year 2024 by leading and participating in different innovation projects that allow generating synergies between complementary companies in the sector, with the aim of impacting the improvement of competitiveness and increasing the added value of the participating companies.
In this sense, on an international scale, the Cluster leads the project GREEN IMPACKT, focused on the sustainable transformation of industrial value chains related to plastic and packaging in Colombia. The project aims to support the transition of approximately 150 Colombian SMEs, with challenges and concerns related to the management of plastics or packaging, towards a circular economy, through collaboration with solution providers from the European Union.
The central idea is to offer SMEs access to tools and knowledge to strengthen their skills and adopt more sustainable practices in the sector through cooperation with European suppliers. The project includes training activities in circular economy, development of tools, preparation of roadmaps and monitoring, access to success stories, knowledge about available resources, facilitation of access to financing sources that promote the circular economy in the sector, among others.
The project, led by the Cluster, which will begin in April 2024 and is scheduled to end in October 2025, has a budget of €358.386 and the support of ANDI (National Association of Entrepreneurs of Colombia) and CLEAN Cluster. GREEN IMPACKT is funded by AL-INVEST Verde, a European Union program to mobilize EU knowledge and investment and support the creation of alliances with the private sector in Latin America. The global objective is to promote sustainable growth and job creation by supporting the transition to a low-carbon, resource-efficient and more circular economy in Latin America.
The Cluster joins the European initiatives: VALUE4PACK
During the year 2024 and until November 2025, the Packaging Cluster will participate in a new European project focused on the food sector, the VALUE4PACK, which aims to strengthen interregional collaborations to boost innovation and investment capacity of the European food packaging value chain. The project will increase the capacity of companies in the food packaging value chain to participate in cross-regional innovation projects and initiatives, develop new business ideas and make concrete investments in cross-regional innovation to achieve new solutions.
The project, financed by the European Union, has a budget of €1.477.721 and will have the participation of NATUREEF Association, Pack4Food, Flanders' FOOD, Lithuanian food exporters association (LitMEA), Valorial, le réseau innovation agri-agro, Agrifood Clust-ER, Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna, DBH Group, Omnipack Packaging Technology Cluster, Gospodarska zbornica Slovenije, CLIC Innovation Oy, Packbridge, Clúster Alimentario de Galicia, POLYMERIS, LETVIJAS PARTIKAS UZNEMUMU FEDERACIJA and the Packaging Cluster.
In addition to these two projects, the Packaging Cluster has presented 6 proposals in different European calls in various areas of sustainable packaging - reuse, traceability, bioplastics, adaptation of processes and machinery, measurement of the carbon footprint - which They are currently pending resolution.
