The NF4 consortium and Natural Products Canada sign a Memorandum of Understanding
On May 9th, 2019, the NF4 consortium held a High-Level Advisory Board (HLAB) in parallel to leading international event on nutraceuticals, Vitafoods Europe. The members of the European consortium NF4 / New Frontiers in Food gathered in Geneva in order to go further on the European actions within the project, in accordance with the expectations of SMEs. The HLAB was the opportunity for European companies to take part in the project and meet other European companies from the clusters.
On this occasion, the NF4 members had the pleasure to host the executive team of Natural Products Canada and invited them to be involved in the discussions. NPC is Canada’s centre of excellence for commercialisation and research of natural products, funded by the National Centres of Excellence along with numerous private and public partners who share the belief in the untapped opportunities around natural products.
Alongside the members of NF4 consortium were SMEs, public institutions and NPC, as the Canadian partner of NF4, who took part in the meeting to share their experiences, feedback and knowledge on their respective ecosystems. This moment of collaboration aimed to strengthen the relationships between international clusters as well as strengthening the European food innovation ecosystem.
Since 2016, NF4 and NPC have been collaborating, resulting in key achievements for European SMEs. A key action was the partnership mission to Canada, in October 2018 during the Benefiq event, where NF4 and NPC collaborated to set up a tailored program for companies who joined the mission (including collective visits, business matchmaking, workshops etc.).
This collaboration between NF4 and NPC was formalised as a Memorandum of Understanding on May 9th, to develop a long-term partnership strategy and create deeper relationships between European and Canadian SMEs.
The NF4 project is an internationalisation fast track accelerator for innovation-intensive food SMEs, powered by a 5-way alliance of food clusters: Clusaga (ES); Food Valley (NL); Valorial (FR); Vitagora (FR) and Wagralim (BE). The project is an extension of the successfully defined roadmap of the New Frontiers in Food initial partnership. The activities are focused on 3 food industry value chains: processed foods, health & nutritional food products and connected food.