On Monday, February 18, 2019, the opening of the FOSTEX kick-off meeting took place in Terrassa, Spain. The project aims at the establishment of two advanced textiles' centers in Jordan universities and upgrade textile centers in Morocco  in order to promote the textile sector in these countries via: (1) boosting competitiveness by lowering production cost, increasing productivity, developing  quality and design, and implementing international conformity certification; (2) maintaining and increasing the local market share and creating a stronger image of the “Made in Jordan” and “Made in Morocco” products in comparison to Chinese/Asian products; (3) supporting exports to surrounding markets, mainly European, US and Arab markets; (4) exploring niche manufacturing opportunities (i.e. specialized products such as advanced/high end textiles) where the competitive advantage is not the price.

Dimos Papakonstantinou and Faye Plakantonaki represented CRE.THI.DEV. and presented the organization as well as the Quality and Evaluation work package. Dimos Papakonstantinou had the chance to present also other EU funded projects in which CRE.THI.DEV participates, namely CLICHA: Climate Change in Agriculture, WOMEN4ICT: Innovative Solutions to increase the numbers of EU vulnerable girls and young women into the digital agenda and SPID-AP: Sport Inclusion Drivers for Autistic spectrum disorders People.

The kick-off meeting ended February 20, with the presentation of the Textile Research & Teaching at Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya and a visit to Textile Section Facilities in ESEIAAT and INTEXTER.

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