Industrial Ecosystems: Textile

Submitted by Veronika Muller on 19 October 2020

Summary of the European Alliance Against Coronavirus Daily Webinar on 25 September 2020

How can clusters be involved in the recovery of the textile ecosystem? Mikael Garellick, DG GROW, presented the scope of the ecosystem, which includes textile & clothing, leather, and footwear. It counts with 198 billion EUR in turnover, and gathers 212,000 companies, which are mostly SMEs. The textile ecosystem was hit very hard by the COVID-19 crisis, with 80 % of the companies having to lay off workers. As it has a strong impact on the environment and climate, the recovery should focus on a green and digital transition with the establishment of recycling hubs, subsidies to switch to renewable energies, and the digitisation of companies.

Stéphan Vérin, EuraMaterials, presented the actions launched within the French recovery plan, to which the cluster gave suggestions. They place materials at the core of the sovereignty of European industry. The suggestions include: cluster support for innovation management and inward investment projects for sovereignty of production chains in the materials processing industry, referencing actors of value chains for access to raw materials, defining circular economy vision in our value chains, and special investment funds for start-ups.

Robin Oddon, Techtera, shared the cluster´s activities as a point of contact for the policymakers as well as for the industry to exchange information and give recommendations. Some were adopted by the government, which referred to the R&D financing and cooperation between universities and companies. They will continue their activities towards the recovery with webinars and support for the companies to implement the planned projects. Financing tools for clusters still pose a barrier to increase their activity.

António Braz Costa, CITEVE, presented the development of the challenges for the Portuguese textile industry, as the future cannot be prepared without looking into the past. Despite their good achievements during the crisis, with just an 8 % drop in turnover, the ecosystem has to invest in resilience. Their strategy for the future includes actions on the bio-circular transition, portfolio transition, digital transition, energetic transition, employment & human capital, markets, knowledge base, and clustering.\\

A recording of the session is available here.

These are the presentations shown during the meeting:

Textile_ECCP_2020.pdf Techtera - ECA Webinar Meeting on the Textiles Industrial Ecosystem (1).pdf Cluster presentation ecosystem_Mikael Garellick.pdf

Find information and recordings of previous meetings on the Role of Clusters in Accelerating the European Recovery (since September 2020) here. For European Alliance Against Coronavirus webinar summaries of March - July 2020, please follow this link.

Finally, please find information on the upcoming agenda here.

Share this Article