The international Project ClusterFY entered in 2020 to the monitoring phase - a period associated with the implementation of activities listed in the approved “Slovak Action Plan for Cluster Organization Support Policy Improvement”.
Crucial moment of the beginning of second phase for SIEA was announcing the Calls for applications for a non-repayable financial contribution aimed at business networking support by Ministry of Economy of the Slovak Republic (MoE) in February. The calls are intended for clusters with at least Bronze certificate according to ESCA evaluation, valid on the day of application submission. The goal is to support the activities of the cluster organization aimed at fulfilling the tasks and goals arising from the document “Strategy for the development of the cluster organization” and to support streamlining activities based on recommendations arising from the certification process. Current form of the calls conditions is a result of team cooperation of our stakeholders, representatives from SIEA, MoE, Slovak Cluster Union and cluster members that created a „working group”(WG). The calls are also key subjects of our Action plan implementation that aims to monitor these support tools and then cooperate on their modifications if necessary.
One of the WG member, MoE organized during the pandemic situation an information webinar for potential call applicants and everyone interested in cluster support. During the information seminar eligibility of projects /expenditure, selection and evaluation criteria were presented. At the webinar were present many representatives from clusters and members of our stakeholder group, including members of ClusterFY team from SIEA. The calls are open the first round of applications is expected to conclude at the end of the May.
