Several Swedish regions are teaming up to boost the country’s food industry by providing companies with better access to knowledge, skills and infrastructure. The collaboration will make it easier for smaller companies to innovate and lower their environmental impact, and create competitive food products and services.
- 30 July 2020
There are many things we can and must do better to lower the impacts of food on the climate if we collaborate and use each other’s competence, experience and tools. SAMLA is only the beginning of a network of people and organisations with fantastic food competence, from practical to very strategic. We need to use each other’s strengths.
Food is Sweden’s fourth largest industry, yet up until recently it has been given little attention or support. While the country’s new national and regional food strategies have approved initiatives aimed at supporting sustainable development and growth, this support is often limited to one region.
For these initiatives to succeed, regional actors need to collaborate. The Samutveckling för Livsmedelsbranschens Acceleration, or Development for the Acceleration of the Food Industry (SAMLA), acts as a coordinator between regional bodies like science parks and consultants, and between regional and national organisations, to provide a picture of what SMEs need and find ways to help them. SAMLA is a project by Sweden’s RISE research institute.
Ingredients for success
It can often be time-consuming and difficult to persuade companies to try new approaches. This is especially the case in Sweden, where small companies with low margins are the norm. The national food industry consists of 4 600 companies, of which only 650 have more than 10 employees.
These small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are facing similar challenges and may have created solutions which could be shared.
SAMLA launched a website to provide SMEs with guidance, and has developed a digital library of resources for innovation support. The website gathers information on the food system and is used by business developers and government strategists. A digital chat platform helps users to collaborate and share expertise.
Regional actors hold monthly video meetings to stay informed. One of the regional actors hosts two meetings a year to help the others learn more about that region, and to present inspiring companies and other initiatives that can help.
Regional and national partnerships
The project originally began in three regions. Eleven are now taking part. Food federations and several authorities with responsibility for the national food strategy are involved in the project.
The project has received much interest from national organisations. SAMLA gave input for Sweden’s food strategy plan for 2020-2025.
It offered a network for the food industry to find ways of mitigating the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and it was asked to contribute to a national meeting on how to mitigate the pandemic’s effects on the industry.
In the final stages of the project, SAMLA will bring together up to 200 companies at a seminar intended to generate further innovation.
Total investment and EU funding
Total investment for the project “SAMLA - SAMutveckling för Livsmedelsbranschens Acceleration” is EUR 751 500, with the EU’s European Regional Development Fund contributing EUR 355 000 through the “National regional fund programme for investments in growth and jobs” Operational Programme for the 2014-2020 programming period.