CLAY
Cross Sector support for Innovative and Competitive Artistic Ceramic SMEs
- Programme: Interreg Europe 2014–2020
- Lead partner: Umbria Region, Italy
- Partner countries: Italy, Spain, Portugal, Romania, France and Finland
- Duration: First phase: 1 June 2018–31 May 2021, second phase: 1 June 2021 – 31 May 2023
- Total budget: 1.34M€ of which 1.1M€ funded from the EU Structural Funds
- Regional Council of South Ostrobothnia budget: 212 000 € with national contribution of 32 000 €
Project in Short
Funded under the Interreg Europe Programme, the CLAY project aims at strengthening the artistic ceramic sector in different European regions. In the project’s partner regions, we look for good practices that support renewing ceramic manufacturing methods, updating design and marketing, increasing internationalisation and, generally, improving the competitivity of the ceramic sector.
Through the CLAY project in South Ostrobothnia, we seek to strengthen the conditions for activities in the ceramic field. We pursue new ways of collaboration between different sectors and encourage actors of the field to deploy innovative solutions which can be used to improve e.g. marketing.
In the project we visit the partner regions and hold virtual meetings where we share information and experiences from the good practices. Based on this, each partner will create their regional action plan that aims at developing policy instruments respectively.
The regional stakeholder group also plays an important role in the project. The group involves entrepreneurs from the ceramic sector and other relevant actors. The stakeholder group meets a few times a year, and in these meetings the group members address the presented good practices and discuss how to adapt these in their own region. The lead partner in project Clay is Umbria Region in Central Italy where ceramics hold a very long tradition. The other partners in the project are the following:
- European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation Cities of Ceramic, AEuCC (Advisory Partner, legally based in Spain, headquarters in Italy)
- Association for the development and promotion of the European ceramic centre (France)
- CTCV Technological Centre for Ceramics and Glass (Portugal)
- Regional Development Agency South West Oltenia (Romania)
- Regional Council of South Ostrobothnia (Finland)
CLAY project has two phases. During the first phase the partners focus on identifying good practices. All project partners plan regional action plans that support developing regional ceramic sectors and the regional policy instruments. The duration of the second phase is two years during which the partners monitor the implementation of the regional action plans.
As part of the implementation of the CLAY regional action plan, the South Ostrobothnia Regional Council has developed “Service path for creative industries” in cooperation with the ELY Centre. The service path helps entrepreneurs to understand what business development services and support are available to them in their area at different stages of the life of their business, and provides links to help them contact service providers. The idea of the service path is based on Creative Finland’s national descriptions of “Advisory services” and “Public funding“.
The total budget of project CLAY is about 1.34 M€. The budget of the Regional Council of South Ostrobothnia is about 212 000 € of which the national contribution is about 32 000 €.
