The second call for funding for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) of the European project GEN4OLIVE has received 27 proposals from 27 companies for the development of activities related with olive breeding. On this occasion, GEN4OLIVE will award initiatives of up to 10,000 euros to carry out individual projects lasting 12 months.  

The objective of this second call, with a budget of 250,000 euros and finalized on January 25th, is to provide financial support to SMEs so that they can design an olive breeding plan taking advantage of existing genetic resources inside and outside the Germplasm Banks. It is also expected that they will be able to develop a feasibility study related to the commercial and technical aspects of the proposal that will allow its subsequent validation. 

Regarding participation data, the companies that have submitted proposals come from eight countries: Albania, Spain, Georgia, Greece, France, Italy, Morocco and Turkey. The high presence of Spanish SMEs is particularly noteworthy, accounting for 44% of the initiatives, followed by Italian (15%) and Turkish (15%). Once the application period has closed, an evaluation period will be established in which an independent committee of experts will select the proposals to be financed. The selected SMEs will be contacted in April 2023 so that they can start their breeding plans. 

This second GEN4OLIVE call for funding for SMEs follows a first one, which ended in December 2021. It received 35 proposals from 63 companies for the implementation of individual or collective projects. In the end, the panel of independent expert evaluators selected six collaborative projects and two individual projects as suitable, which received financial endowments of 100,000 euros and 50,000 euros, respectively. Some of the themes of the chosen initiatives were the recovery and revalorization of olive varieties or the development of a smart App to evaluate and manage olive farms. These projects are already in development and their results will be published at the end of GEN4OLIVE. 

About GEN4OLIVE

GEN4OLIVE is a project funded by the Horizon 2020 programme of the European Union (EU). With a budget of 6,998,282 euros and a 48-month duration, the consortium is made up of 16 national and international entities. The project is coordinated by the University of Cordoba and involves partners such as the universities of Jaén and Granada, Technological Corporation of Andalusia (CTA) and the Andalusian companies Balam Agriculture, Cambrico Biotech and Santa Cruz Ingeniería.