A study tour to Edinburgh (Scotland) was organised in the period 21-23 June 2004 for partners and managers of companies participating in the SARA project, which ARC Fund has joint since August 2003. The purpose of the trip was for participants to visit and learn from leading Scottish companies operating in the agrifood sector that already benefit from utilising modern management techniques, like Value Engineering, SME networking, Supply chain management – tools and approaches that are similar to those to be synthesised in the SARA toolkit. The programme included visits to five production companies (mainly from the field of fish processing, bakery and brewery), a big retail chain (ASDA Wal-Mart), as well as a business center and 2 colleges providing support and training to companies. The companies were selected to provide an example of how an SME could be successful when having the appropriate strategy in terms of market niche, choosing suppliers, offering value to clients, investing in people, implementing innovative techniques and working in networks. Partners should now transfer this experience to client companies to be trained in the four target regions of the project – Plovdiv (Bulgaria), Thessaloniki (Greece), Seville (Spain) and Bremerhaven (Germany), thus helping them in enhancing their business operations and competitiveness.
SARA is an EU-funded project aimed at improving the competitiveness of companies in the agro-food sector. It combines the efforts of five partner organisations, including the Thessaloniki Technology Park in Greece (as coordinator), Eddleston Innovation Ltd. in Scotland (as scientific leader), the Andalusian Institute of Technology in Spain, TTZ (Centre for Technology Transfer) in Germany and ARC Fund in Bulgaria.
Project contact: Ms. Borislava Severova (borislava.severova@online.bg)
Additional information on SARA is also available here.
