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Author: WeBalkans

Learning the art of business in an unlikely place

Written by WeBalkans on . Posted in Stories.

A young entrepreneur from Serbia travels to a small village in Spain to learn the art of business Torralba de Ribota has only 120 residents and its economy could be described as far from vibrant. This village in northeast Spain has no shops and only one bar, and the inhabitants’ main source of income is farming. Yet it is here that 31 years old Serbian entrepreneur, Mladen Savković, chose to spend a month to improve his business skills. Mladen is a public relations (PR) professional who, after working for ten years in journalism and freelance PR for art and cultural activities, recently opened his own PR agency. However, Mladen realised that he needed support to perform better. “I came across a story about a woman from Serbia who founded a homemade pasta company. To improve her business, she had successfully applied for EU funding to go to Sicily for a few months to learn the craft from experts. That seemed ideal to me! So I started researching how she got to go there,” he says.

“I thought that if you learn how to engage an audience there, you can engage an audience anywhere.”

This is how Mladen found out about the MOVE-YE project, which is funded under the European Union’s COSME programme. Like many other young people, Mladen jumped at the chance of a working visit to an EU country. As he speaks Spanish, Spain seemed like an obvious choice. Where to go? His first idea was to go to Madrid or Barcelona. He explains that he had plenty of host company options, most of them in tourism, IT and other sectors. But he was attracted by an opportunity in the cultural sector that came up in Torralba de Ribota. “I was interviewed by two ladies who ran the Saltamontes Festival of art and music in the village, and was really impressed. This is a small village, and they have managed to organise a successful arts festival! I thought to myself if you can learn how to engage an audience there, you can engage an audience anywhere and decided that this was the right opportunity for me.” Mladen spent a full month working at the Saltamontes Festival. He saw the importance of promoting art and culture outside of urban areas, where it still forms a vital part of everyday life, but in a slightly different way. “I have become more aware of the importance of engaging with the local community and listening to their cultural needs and interests,” he says.

“I have become more aware of the importance of engaging with the local community and listening to their cultural needs and interests.”

The EU-funded MOVE-YE (Mobilising Entrepreneurial Values and Ideas Across Europe) project aims to enhance entrepreneurial culture and the networking between European entrepreneurs. Funded under the COSME programme, it offers both young and experienced entrepreneurs the opportunity to observe different business practices, understand new markets, and internationalise and innovate their business via a cross-border mobility scheme. Bringing the experience home Mladen mostly works with institutions that organise cultural events and festivals. Now he is planning to introduce to his clients in Serbia the audience engagement methods that he learned in Spain. “You can make an exhibition and just put it there. But I learned that it is important to work with the audience and focus on engaging the community more intensely. The experience at the Saltamontes Festival made me think about ideas that I can implement here in Serbia,” he says.

A small company that wants to stay that way

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A Serbian clothing business that blends creativity with eco-design is thriving with EU support Regenerik is one of a new wave of innovative clothing brands gaining ground in Serbia. The company produces urban clothing and handmade accessories from materials like natural fibres and recycled and biodegradable materials. This type of manufacturing is not very common in Serbia, or in the rest of the Western Balkan region. Danica Tomić is one of the founders of Regenerik. She graduated as an architect and until a year ago she never thought of herself working as anything else. After graduation, she took up an internship opportunity at an architectural firm, but soon became frustrated with the nature of the administrative tasks assigned to interns. Danica had a burning desire to do something creative. From architecture to fashion When a close friend quit his job and suggested she join him in a new business, she agreed under one condition – that the work in the start-up would use her creativity. Her sister soon joined the team and the newly-formed trio had plenty of energy, but they lacked a specific business idea. Nor did they have any ideas as to where they could turn for advice.

“When I participated in the first workshop, I had no clear idea about the type of business I wanted to start… I am an architect, but I always had a passion for fashion design.”

Danica is a proactive person, so she immediately began searching online and asking her friends for advice on starting a business. One friend told her about a programme for start-ups funded by the European Union, supporting young entrepreneurs in developing their business skills. “When I participated in the first workshop, I had no clear idea about the type of business I wanted to start… I am an architect, but I always had a passion for fashion design, and following the discussion and analysis with the mentors on the course I decided to start Regenerik,” says Danica. Danica also improved her skills in product development and presentation at these workshops, as well as learning about business management. Combining this knowledge with her passion, she and her friends successfully launched their business. They have since expanded, hiring additional employees who work together on the manufacture of Regenerik products.

“I feel better and more comfortable when I know that other people will grow together with us.This is the core idea of Regenerik: joint work, joint benefits and protection of the environment.”

The project also aimed to impact the employability of young people in the long term. The project partners worked on developing the capacities of over 120 civil society organisations in the Western Balkans so that they could cooperate in designing and implementing innovative approaches to youth employability and employment. The project is run by the Belgrade Open School along with partners from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Montenegro, and the Olof Palme International Centre (Sweden). Small is the best fit Danica does not dream of a big company. She says she would be delighted if her business continued to grow steadily so she could engage more people who could work on the handmade manufacturing of Regenerik products. “I feel better and more comfortable when I know that other people will grow together with us, and this is the core of the idea of Regenerik: joint work, joint benefits and protection of the environment,” she says. The training programme that Danica participated in was organised by the EU-funded WeB4YES project. Along with Danica, over 1,000 other young people from the Western Balkans have benefitted from new skills and launched start-ups or been employed in other companies following participation in this project.

Free flow on a firm business footing

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A Macedonian music production company teaching musicians the art of the music business. Luka Gorgievski, 26, is a member of the band Funk Shui from North Macedonia. Founded in 2010, the band describes its music as free flow. When asked about his inspiration to become a musician, Luka says: “It was mesmerising when I found out that humans can communicate through something other than words. It is almost an elite privilege.” “Knowing that, I cherish the gift and try to make more people smile and dance, and take away their fear. And they feel it. By chance, I learned how to make it work,” he adds. The band has several recordings and is well known in North Macedonia and other countries in the Western Balkans. However, their professional music journey has had many challenges too. When asked what these challenges were, Luka says ‘What was not a challenge would be a better question. There were loads of them!’

“It was mesmerising when I found out that humans can communicate through something other than words. It is almost an elite privilege.”

Learning the business of art The business aspect of their work was one of the main challenges. Funk Shui resolved this problem by cooperating with a professional music manager. Gorjana Jordanovska, who works for Password Production, a music management company, explains that most artists in North Macedonia are “not educated in the music business”. “They don’t know how to sell themselves. They don’t know how to work in this professional music world. They only know how to play,” she says.

“They don’t know how to sell themselves…They only know how to play”

Not just for musicians In addition, HEMI will also facilitate publishing of content and news promotion, linking upcoming and famous artists, entrepreneurs, festival promoters, cultural venue event managers, music schools and more, under a common music marketing community. The project began in 2019 and will run until the end of 2023. By then, the project will have supported music artists by launching a platform for the promotion and business education of music artists. The project will also offer the HEMI Music Innovation Incubator where musicians will learn how to use ICT and online marketing for promoting their music further, as well as business development and management skills to meet the current and future challenges of the music industry. So while Luka’s music is making people smile and dance, Gorjana and her colleagues are ensuring that he and his fellow artists in the region are operating on a solid business foundation. Password Production decided to address this challenge systematically with the aim of helping their clients and other musicians with music business education. Along with partners from Czechia, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Slovenia, they launched a project named Hub for the Exchange of Music Innovation in Central and South-Eastern Europe, or HEMI. The project is funded by the European Union’s Creative Europe programme. “The HEMI project provides expertise, consultancy and training modules to music professionals in Central and South-Eastern Europe, responding to the current and future needs of the sector in the region but also more widely across Europe,” Gorjana says. Gorjana believes that this project will be an essential contribution to the professional development of the music community. Apart from access to professional consultancy in business education, artists will also have an opportunity to perform in festivals organised by partner organisations in all nine countries in the project.

“Between two empires” exhibition opens for visitors at the Užice National Museum in Serbia

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František Topič is one of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s most prominent and pioneering photographers, who spent much of his working life in the then Provincial Museum of BiH, first as an archivist and then as a librarian, secretary and photographer. His rare collection of pictures dating from the late 19th and early 20th centuries have recently been collected and presented in an exhibition titled “Between Two Empires: Bosnia and Herzegovina photographed by František Topič 1885-1919”. The pictures included in the exhibition are mostly unpublished.

 

These images show the meeting of two civilisations – the departing Ottomans and the newly arrived Austro-Hungarians – a century ago. Following the exhibition’s tour in Zagreb and Ljubljana, now the people of Užice in Serbia have the opportunity to see these attractive photographs.

 

The exhibition is supported through an EU funded project “Museum Stories”.

EU and Serbia together against floods

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In the last six years, the EU has set aside more than €170 million for flood prevention, as well as for recovery and reconstruction in Serbia. Valjevo is only one of the Serbian towns that has benefitted from that money. A total of six kilometres along the Jablanica, Kolubara, and Obnica rivers around Valjevo have been protected from floods. Valjevo is now probably Serbia’s one of the most protected towns.

 

The completion of the works was marked near the Veselinović bridge over the river Obnica. In attendance were the Head of the European Union Delegation to Serbia, Ambassador Sem Fabrizi, as well as the Director of the Austrian Cultural Centre, Adrian Feix on behalf of his country’s Embassy, and the Mayor of Valjevo, Lazar Gojković, the director of Srbijavode, Goran Puzović and the director of the Office for Public Investment Management, Marko Blagojević.

 

“I am glad to be in this city again,” said Ambassador Sem Fabrizi. “Last month, I was in Valjevo to meet with medical staff hired by the EU to fight COVID-19 in Serbia. On that occasion, I promised the mayor that I would come again to mark the end of the project to protect the citizens of Valjevo from the flood.” The Ambassador also recalled the great floods of 2014, when 50 municipalities in Serbia and 1.5 million people were affected by the catastrophe. Then, too, the EU showed its solidarity in the efforts to recover from the consequences of the flooding.

EU continues to support investment in rural tourism

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The European Union’s EU4AGRI project today launched a public call for support to investments in rural tourism in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The project aims to develop economic activities in rural areas, to open new jobs and retain existing ones, and to preserve natural and cultural heritage. At the same time, the support aims to respond to the recovery needs caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

The public call is open solely to partnerships consisting of an applicant with a minimum of three partners. The applicants can be local governments, companies or entrepreneurs that provide services or products in the tourism sector. Each partnership can apply for between BAM 20,000 and BAM 200,000, depending on the number of the partners. The partnership must secure co-financing for at least 15% of the total value of the proposed investment. The public call is published on the EU4AGRI official website.

 

The preliminary list of all public calls under the EU4AGRI project can be found here.

The deadline for submission of applications is 15:00 on 21 December 2020.

 

EU4AGRI is a four-year (2020-2024) European Union project valued at BAM 20.25 million that aims to modernise the agri-food sector in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The project is jointly implemented and co-financed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in BiH and the Czech Development Agency (CzDA).

High Representative / Vice-President Josep Borrell met with Prime Minister Zoran Zaev

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EU High Representative / Vice-President Josep Borrell had a video conference call with the Prime Minister of North Macedonia, Zoran Zaev, in Brussels on Thursday. High Representative Borrell congratulated Prime Minister Zaev on his re-appointment and encouraged the government of North Macedonia to continue delivering on the EU reform agenda.

 

He also reiterated that the EU remains committed to supporting North Macedonia in its response to the coronavirus pandemic and its consequences. The European Commission recently announced a very substantial Economic and Investment Plan to support the Western Balkans’ long-term recovery and bring the region closer to the EU.

 

High Representative Borrell welcomed the fact that North Macedonia’s level of alignment with EU foreign policy positions has increased in recent years, and thanked North Macedonia for its contributions to the EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy missions and operations.

EU Ambassador Soreca presents the EU Green Agenda for the Western Balkans

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EU Ambassador to Albania Luigi Soreca today launched the second phase of the “Europe is here” communication campaign focused on the EU Green Agenda for the Western Balkans, climate change and other environmental issues.

 

The European Green Deal is an ambitious and comprehensive plan to turn the European Union into a modern, resource-efficient and competitive economy. The Green Agenda for the Western Balkans will provide further assistance, for instance in developing a circular economy and air quality strategies.

 

Under the motto ”Europe is here,” the campaign informs the public about the EU’s financial assistance to Albania, especially in key sectors such as infrastructure/transport, the environment and agriculture.  The second phase launch event was organised in the town of Kukës in the presence of local authorities, environmental organisations, civil society, the business community and the media.

 

In his remarks, EU Ambassador Soreca said that “The commitment of the EU to protect our environment is based on a simple fact: the benefits of protecting ecosystems by far outweigh the cost of their degradation. From Brussels to Kukës, from the EU Green Deal to our assistance in Albania, the European Union is working on the same priorities”.

 

The “Europe is here” environmental campaign will explain how the EU is already changing Albania through its engagement on improving air pollution, the use of pesticides, waste treatment, river quality and biodiversity.

Cities connecting through art

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How one project is helping a Macedonian artist link up with EU counterparts and promote his work abroad.

Goce Ilievski is an artist from Skopje, North Macedonia, who works with contemporary, traditional, and digital art forms. He has held 12 solo exhibitions and participated in group exhibitions both at home and abroad, and won many awards for his oil paintings, watercolours, and photographs. His professional journey, however, has not been without its challenges. 

Goce explains that while his family and friends have always been supportive, it is very difficult to live and earn a living as an artist in North Macedonia. “It’s a limited market here but fortunately the internet opens up much wider possibilities. I derive most of my income from other countries and by focusing online, I can apply for many projects and promote my work to new audiences. Otherwise, it would be very difficult for me to live off my art.”

Artists gain much inspiration from exchanging with other cultures, and visiting other countries opens up possibilities for showcasing their work more widely. Goce is no exception in this regard, and when he saw an announcement to participate in the EU-funded CreArt project, he immediately applied. CreArt (the Network of Cities for Artistic Creation) is a network consisting of European cities, and public and private cultural institutions. Artists who participate in CreArt activities are selected through open calls, and benefit from residencies, training and promotion opportunities in the participating cities. 

“I derive most of my income from other countries and by focusing online, I can apply for many projects and promote my work to new audiences. Otherwise, it would be very difficult for me to live off my art.”

Inspiration and connections Goce’s application was successful, and the project provided him with the opportunity to visit Kaunas, Lithuania, where he stayed for a month and exhibited his work. “Although the timing of the residency was not the best – as it was very cold while I was there! – the people were very nice and warm. I also liked the landscape, and the ways in which their community and infrastructure systems work.”

Apart from inspiration and cultural enrichment, this trip also allowed Goce to overcome his main professional concern: selling his work outside of his native North Macedonia.

“This was a highly valuable experience, as I now have additional channels and possibilities to market my art through my newly-gained connections and skills.”

Creating ‘culturally alive’ cities The CreArt network’s coordinating body is a Spanish cultural foundation – the Fundacion Municipal De Cultura – Ayuntamiento De Valladolid. The partner institution in North Macedonia is the city of Skopje, which joined the project in its second phase. Goce is one of over 380 artists and 65 curators who have already taken part in network activities since its launch eight years ago.

Funded by the Creative Europe Programme, the motto of CreArt is, – ‘When culturally alive, a city is both healthier and freer’. Research carried out by the network has shown the value of artistic creation to local development, not only creating jobs, but also attracting investors and contributing to social innovation. By broadening opportunities for cultural operators, this collaborative platform is playing a key role in creative, social and economic development of cities across Europe.

His study trip included workshops where he learned about building connections between artists and sales agents from different countries, and the promotion of joint artistic cooperation across borders. “This was a highly valuable experience, as I now have additional channels and possibilities to market my art through my newly-gained connections and skills,” Goce says, adding that he believes this was perhaps the main benefit of his experience.

New work opportunities for people with disabilities in Bosnia-Herzegovina

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Meet Rubina – whose life-altering diagnosis prompted a new start and a new business.

While it is common to hear of people leaving the countryside for jobs in the cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina , the reverse is more unusual. One of those to do so is 38-year-old, Rubina Dzanovic. Rubina graduated in Graphic Design, but she had never managed to get a job. A native of Sarajevo, Rubina had always lived in the capital until a devastating multiple sclerosis diagnosis changed her life-course.

“I was well psychologically. However, my physical condition was dire – it is a chronic illness. I was in pain, and I could not sleep at night,” she says. As a way of easing the pain, doctors advised spending some time in the clean air of the countryside. Subsequently, Rubina began to pay regular visits to her mother’s village, which has a thermal spring. “Every time I went to the village, I felt better. As a result, we started to spend more time there, and at some point, my husband and I decided to move to the village for good,” she says.

“Every time I went to the village, I felt better. As a result, we started to spend more time there, and at some point, my husband and I decided to move to the village for good”

A little help goes a long way Moving from the city to the countryside was not without its challenges. With some savings, the family bought a cow and began subsistence farming. But realistically, they needed to find a way to earn a living. Developing a farming business seemed like an obvious choice, and encouraged by one of their neighbours, they purchased some more cows and began making homemade cheese. This proved popular, and while sales were good, an ever-increasing workload called for additional support. Although Rubina is not a big fan of social media platforms, she occasionally checks her Facebook page. On one occasion, an advertisement caught her attention – an EU-funded call for proposals under the ‘P.O.W.E.R.’ project, implemented by Caritas Bosnia and Herzegovina, which supports the employment of people with disabilities. After a discussion with her husband, they agreed to seek more information. As the local implementing organisation for the project, Rubina got in touch with Caritas Bosnia and Herzegovina. They confirmed her eligibility and explained that application procedure was actually quite simple. Deciding she had nothing to lose, Rubina set about creating a proposal and submitted her application. To become more efficient, what they really needed was a two-wheel tractor. That would allow them to devote more time to increasing their milk yields and cheese production, and expand their range of products. “Thanks to the project, we received a two-wheel tractor which has proven to be of tremendous help. My husband can now perform many farming tasks faster and more efficiently. Simply put, this has been of great support to us,” Rubina says happily. Rubina’s company, ‘Rubi Milk’, mainly sells its homemade cheese and milk by delivery-to-order in Sarajevo. Thanks to the two-wheel tractor, they have recently expanded into growing vegetables. “People are interested in organic and home-grown produce, so we thought – ‘why not add fresh and naturally-grown vegetables to our list of products?’ It proved to be an excellent idea, as our clients love it. Now we deliver fresh vegetables along with the cheese.”

“With proper support, and the right opportunities, people with disabilities can make significant contributions to society.”

The P.O.W.E.R project was implemented as part of the EU Cross-Border Cooperation Programme in Bosnia and Herzegovina – Montenegro. More than 100 people with disabilities have benefitted from the project by increasing their professional capacities through mentorship and training, direct support for purchasing equipment, career guidance, usage of an interactive platform for career development and the employment of people with disabilities, and direct employment support.

Offering the right opportunities For many people with disabilities or health conditions, finding and sustaining work is a challenge. Zlatko Mihalic from Caritas Bosnia and Herzegovina explains that their goal with P.O.W.E.R. is to demonstrate to society that people with disabilities have the same right to access work opportunities as their counterparts without disabilities. “With the proper support, and by offering the right opportunities, people with disabilities can make significant contributions to society. But they face many challenges, ranging from an ever-present stigma to inadequate support tools.” With proper support, beneficiaries can expand and grow their businesses and lives.