Welcome to our new partners to the EIT Food South Community!

Core Partners

Mondragon Corporation

Mondragon, set up in 1956, is a corporation of business cooperatives based in the Basque Country (Spain). Today, it is made up of more than 100 cooperatives and it is one of the most relevant Spanish company in terms of asset turnover and the leading business group in the Basque Country. Mondragon covers four areas of activity: finance, industry, retail and knowledge.

University of Bologna - UNIBO  

With over 86.000 students and 200 degree programmes, the University of Bologna represent one of the key Italian education centres at the national level. Its strength in agrifood and bioeconomy can become an asset for the agrifood sector together with their wide experience in applied research as well as more fundamental research.  

Furthermore, UNIBO is a very active university participating in large number of European research projects (over 270 projects with >100M€ in H2020), especially in bioeconomy and in safe and sustainable food systems, with 1000 researchers and 5000 students in the agrifood and bioeconomy area.

Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche – CNR

CNR is the largest public research institution in Italy. CNR is organized in seven departments, with 91 research institutes and over 9.000 employees. The Department of Biology; Agriculture and Food Sciences is particularly active in the agrifood field and has delivered important researches, also making advantage of  multidisciplinary innovation and providing ready to market technologies. CNR has more than 350 exploited patents and is first, in Italy, in terms of scientific productivity, spin-offs, and ERC grants, with more than 40% of the revenues coming from third party sources.

GRANAROLO

Granarolo, founded in 1957, is the largest Italian group in the dairy sector, with 21 production plants and over 3,000 employees. Based in Bologna, it operates in the fresh milk and dairy-cheese sector (milk, yoghurt, desserts, fresh cream and long-life cream, fresh and aged cheeses, and milk-based baby food), dry pasta, balsamic vinegar of Modena PGI, deli meats and vegetable foods.

Their main interest is the identification of innovative approaches towards safe, sustainable and consumer-supportive food systems along with plastic and waste reduction. 

CAVIRO           

With 12.800 wine growers located in 7 Italian regions, Caviro is the largest wine cooperative in Italy, and the first Italian table wine producer. In particular, Caviro stands out for their advanced “Circular economy model” and their exploitation of winemaking by-products. Besides, they are an active part of the National Italian Cluster and as such, they are recognized as an active actor of the agrifood innovation in Italy.

INALCA

Inalca is the Italian leader in the meat industry and one of the major European players in the beef sector, in the production of burgers and canned meat. Environmental sustainability is one of their highest priorities, which is managed by a dedicated working group that operates within the company’s Quality, Safety, Health and Sustainable Development function. The principal environmental aspects on which the INALCA’s attention are focused regard mainly: 

• Agriculture and Breeding 
• Water
• Packaging 
• Energy and Emissions 
• Waste

Network Partners

BIOAZUL      

BIOAZUL is an engineering and technological SME specially focused on providing eco-innovative technical and business solutions for sustainable industrial and urban water management, including treatment, reuse and resources recovery approaches. They work in the environmental, blue growth, agriculture, foods, water and waste treatment, nature based solution, in the green economy fields.

The food industry represents a key sector for water management. Thus, measures to optimise the use of water resources, at process level and at the end of pipe, and in line with circular economy approaches towards zero waste schemes, can be of the utmost importance to the agrifood field.

GENESIS Biomed     

Genesis Biomed is a consultancy firm in the biomedical healthcare sector specialized in providing services to spin off and startup companies, entrepreneurs and research centers. We participate in the preparation of business plans, market analysis, competition study, strategic monitoring, voice of customer study, cost-effectiveness, business models, etc. Our contribution through a commercial approach provides solidity to the innovation projects in which we participate, which increases the chances of achieving the main objectives. We have worked, among others, on projects related to microbiomes, food supplements to help preventing different diseases, development of probiotics, development of salty flavour enhancers for patients with hypertension, etc.

In addition, GENESIS Biomed is currently Associate Partner of EIT Health, where we participate in 8 projects, and also External Partner of EIT Digital, where we participate in one project.

Cluster Agrifood Nazionale - CLAN              

The National Technology Agrifood Cluster CL.A.N. in Italy is a multi-stakeholder network of key national players of the entire agrifood chain - a partnership of companies, research centres and institutions set up to promote sustainable economic growth, based on research and innovation in the industry and acting as a partner for Italian and European Institutions.  

It is a non-profit association with more than 100 members ranging from large, medium and small-sized enterprises, to universities, public and private research institutions, business associations, and non-governmental organizations.

Cluster FOOD+I - FDi        

CLUSTER FOOD+i is a private, non-profit business association recognized as an Innovative Business Group by the Spanish Ministry of Industry. Nowadays, the association brings together 100 industry members, mostly food SMEs (84%) located across the regions that make up the Ebro Valley region in Spain. This region represents the 25% of the Spanish agri-food industries and the 34% of the sector turnover.

The main goal of FOOD+i is to promote the competitiveness of the food sector through collaboration and innovation. The organization has recently been recognized as one of the main cluster of reference in the field of Bioeconomy in Spain by the EU. FOOD+i is also very active in different focus areas such as entrepreneurship and executive training within the agri-food sector.

Associate Partners

Food lndustry Association of Castilla y León – Vitartis

Vitartis is a food association formed by 120 members, 70% of them being SMEs. Their main objective is to increase food industry competitiveness in the Castilla y León region in Spain by encouraging the innovation in food companies and encouraging technology transfer among technology partners and business members. This Cluster involves companies from a wide range of sectors: meat, fish products, canned fruit and vegetables, wine, coffee, dietetic food, biscuit, dairy industry, bakery, sugar, flour, nuts, health, catering, frozen foods, food ingredients, animal feed and agriculture.

Sustainable Food Movement Greece

Sustainable Food Movement Greece (SFMinGR) is an innovative, social startup providing awareness, education and high-end consultation to public, private stakeholders and professionals in order to tackle food waste and promote food sustainability. The enterprise aims to fight food waste and promote the UNSDGs for groups of businesses and SMEs in the Culinary Arts and Hospitality Industry in Greece and abroad. The team plays a key role in regional food policy decision making and runs various food waste initiatives for public, such as  foodity, the Greek surplus food sharing app. Their vision is to make global synergies with potential executives and other startups in order sustainable gastronomy to be a vital part of the global sustainable tourism.