In April, the Alpine Region Preparatory Action Fund (ARPAF) opened its third call for project proposals that aim at supporting the work of EUSALP. EUSALP Action Groups were invited to submit project proposals, of which three were selected for funding with a total EU-Budget of 400.000 EUR:
CAESAR2
To maintain competitiveness and comply with decarbonisation goals, enterprises must reduce their energy consumption. Especially SMEs, which account for a significant part of the economy in the Alpine region, have difficulties analysing their potentials for increased energy efficiency and identifying pathways towards net-zero. The project will highlight the benefits of carbon-footprinting to SMEs, especially from the agro-food sector, and engage them in a process of data analysis. Pilot enterprises will contribute to creating checklists, process lists and tools for assessing their emissions and energy situation and start improving it.
CAESAR2 is a follow-up of the CAESAR project, funded within the second call of ARPAF (https://www.alpine-region.eu/projects/caesar-capacitating-energy-efficiency-small-alpine-enterprises).
COWORCare
The aim of the project COWORCare is to create an online information platform that shows co-working spaces in the Alpine region in combination with offers for child and elderly care. With this platform, young parents and especially women, who still do the vast amount of social care, could be enabled to work in a creative environment close to their homes or holiday stay while having their children/elderly cared for in or nearby the co-working structure. Thus, more young families and single parents could take part in the local labour market, reducing commuter traffic and establishing a more cooperative and open working culture also in remote Alpine valleys.
MadeInTheAlps
Territorial brands that aim to establish 100% local value chains, despite their benefits for territorial development, can result in the proliferation of initiatives requiring investments of inefficient size and hinder collaboration with other regions. The common image of the Alps is a joint cultural asset that could facilitate cross-regional/border value chains. The project MadeInTheAlps will develop policy and managerial insights for collaborative territorial brands initiatives. Through an experiment-based research on consumers’ perceived image of ‘Made in the Alps’ products resulting from cross-regional/border value chains and supporting pilot actions.”
Follow the projects on the EUSALP website.