Transylvania Textile & Fashion cluster

• Access to the European Internal market
• Access to public support (regional/national programmes, innovation vouchers, etc.)
• Facilitation of collaboration between members
• Facilitation of cross-sectorial cooperation
• Support of technology transfer

Success stories:

Circular economy

Taking into account the importance of circular economy, we believe that students in vocational schools should also be aware of his concept. This is why we organized a contest called: Re-Fashion Starts in Schools. This is the First year of this competition and it is now open to every textile school in Covasna county. Our aim is to encourage more students to choose this profession, to improve their skills and competence, to encourage schools to continue teaching texile technology at all levels and to encourage students to create new, innovative products.

Cross-sectoral collaboration

In order to improve and develop cross-sectoral cooperation, our cluster became a member of the Transylvania Cluster Consortium in the Centre-Region in Romania. In this Consortium 19 clusters are  working in various fields such as tourism and health, forestry, furniture, agrofood, green energy and creative industry which also includes IT. Our adherence to the Consortium is important, because the textile industry is an industry that can, and must cooperate with other industries.

Cooperation

The Transylvania Textile & Fashion cluster is part of the cultural and creative industry. For this reason, we have signed a cooperation agreement with the Regional Development Agency in the Centre-Region, which has a project in the Interreg Europe Program under the title “Policies for Cultural Creative Industries: the HUB for innovative regional development”. The aim of this agreement is participating at the activities and meetings of the regional working-group, participating in national and international study visits and workshops organized within the project, drafting strategic documents that underpin the process of improving the promotional and sustainable policies of the Creative Industry in the Centre-Region.

Smart Specialization

The textile industry was not included in the areas of smart specialization. Due to our call to the Central Region Regional Development Agency and a solid argumentation, through which we showed the importance of the textile industry in the region, the textile industry was included in the areas of smart specialization.

National Textile and Leather Industry Olympics

The National Textile and Leather Industry Olympics were held on 6-10 April in Sfântu Gheorghe, event which was hosted by the „Kós Károly” Technological High School. Due to the immediate and serious cooperation between the textile clusters the awarding ceremony was a huge success and one full of joy.

Achievements

• Bronze Label Certificate accorded by  the European Secretariat for Cluster Analysis (ESCA) of VDI/VDE Innovation + Technik GmbH.
• Our cluster has a copyrighted trade mark (please see attached image)
• Organization of national textile Olympiads for students in technological schools
• Collaboration protocols with clusters from Hungary working in different sectors, collaboration protocols of chambers of commerce and industry from Hungary.
• A large number of national and local press articles about the activities of the cluster
• Radio shows and TV reports
• Our cluster has a very good collaboration with the Centru Regional Development Agency. Based on our analysis, argumentation and request, the textile industry was included in the areas of smart specialization.
• We are also members of the workgroup “Working Group to promote cultural and creative industries created under the project of interregional cooperation CRE : HUB – ” Policies for cultural creative industries : the HUB for Innovative regional development” funded under the European Commission’s interregional cooperation – Interreg Europe, implemented by RDA CENTRU.
• Representation of the cluster at ADR CENTER in the working group of the “Textile, Garment, Leather” domain for updating the Intelligent Specialization Strategy.
• We are familiar with funding through Regional Operational Programme, we continually offer advice to our members and we are invited to consultations on developing guidelines and on establishing the regional development strategy.
• Transylvania Textile & Fashion cluster is a member of the Balkan Cluster Network,are present on the Cluster Collaboration platform.
• We are members of the Transylvania Cluster Consortium which includes twenty-one clusters working in different areas from Centru region.
• We are also members of the Romanian Cluster Association (Clustero)