Between 14th and 16th, the Old Customs House–Oporto Conference Centre hosted the 8th edition of Business2Sea, organized by Fórum Oceano with a collaboration of CETMAR, and on the theme “Challenges for the Sea 2030”.
In an event dedicated to the dissemination of the projects related to the Sea and national and international business meetings in this area, the Directorate-General for Maritime Policy was present at the exhibition area, showing the financial opportunities in the sea area, and with direct participation at the conferences.
The Director-General for Maritime Policy, Rúben Eiras, and the Head of Programming Department of DGPM, Sandra Silva, intervened in the conference “Norway-Iceland-Portugal Business Opportunities”, organized jointly by Aicep Portugal Global in partnership with the Norway Embassy in Lisbon, the Directorate-General for Maritime Policy and the Innovation Norway (See Presentation). This conference was supported by the European Economic Area Financial Mechanism (EEA Grants 2014-2021), giving an opportunity to the participants and enterprises to know the access options to specific funds related to common projects between Portugal, Norway, Iceland.
In Portugal, since 2019, should be available 44,7 Million Euros in Programme EEA Grants 2014-2021 “Blue Growth Innovation and SMEs”, englobing the following areas: fisheries, aquiculture (products and innovative technologies in the fisheries sectors), commercial ports, ocean renewable energy sector, maritime industries (including maritime transport technologies), offshore infrastructures, robotics, technologies to resources and deep sea floor mapping, shipbuilding, biotechnology, monitoring and environmental surveillance, and innovative products already existent in the market or in development that use marine debris as raw material.
The Head of Strategy Department of DGPM, Conceição Santos, moderated the debate dedicated to Port Tech Clusters: From Concept to Practical Implementation. This debate included as participants representatives of Port of Leixões, Vigo and La Coruña. The Port Tech Clusters seek to foster the establishment of new enterprises, start-ups and technologic research centers of sea high-industries in Portuguese ports. The objective is to create an entrepreneur generation producing new technologies and innovative maritime services with strong exporter potential. This debate was attended by stakeholders, and it was possible to have a productive dialogue in the sense of understand the state-of-the-art and the future pathway of Port Tech Clusters.
In Ocean Literacy Workshop, moderated by DG MARE, Patrícia Conceição presented and discussed the Blue School program and its national and international potential. This Ocean Literacy program is coordinated by DGPM and includes already 86 schools and about 12 thousand students, involving more than 50 partners from sea and education sectors. (See Presentation)
At the end, the closing session of this event that have occurred on the National Sea Day (November 16th) was also attended by the Director-General of Maritime Policy.