September the 16th, 2021 - The Croatian company Altpro is engaged in the development and production of signalling and other safety equipment for trains and their accompanying infrastructure. Thanks to the recent signing of contracts between them and Koncar, their equipment is set to be placed on Croatian-made trains.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Darko Bicak writes, Altpro has its headquarters in the City of Zagreb, and as they explained, both contracts they signed with Koncar regard the delivery of their equipment for the automatic train protection system which Koncar develops.

Both contracts relate to the supply of Altpro’s built-in vehicle safety systems (ATP) equipment. The first contract defines the delivery of 21 sets of installed equipment for 21 electric Croatian-made trains which Koncar has built for Croatian Railways (Hrvatske zeljeznice).

Each set of built-in equipment includes a central unit of the RAS8385 IS type, as well as all vehicle peripherals. The second contract defines the delivery of one set of installed equipment for the vehicle for track maintenance, which Koncar also builds.

''This set of built-in equipment includes the central unit of the newly developed ATP device type RAS90, as well as all vehicle peripherals. The new RAS90 is fully developed by Altpro and operates on the I60 principle as well as the PZB90 principle, which is based and developed on the experience gained through long-term use. The RAS90 complies with the latest European (EU) technical and safety requirements,'' they explained from the company headed by Zvonimir Viduka.

They added that the end customers in both cases are Croatian-made trains and Croatian railway companies that have recognised the quality, reliability and other advantages of Altpro's products in the field of railway safety. From this technology company, they emphasised that these two contracts will ensure the stability of Altpro's business in the future and strengthen their company's presence and references across the wider market.

Altpro, which currently employs 180 people, signed a 40m-euro contract with the railways in India late last year, and Viduka commented that the company has been trying to break into the Indian market for as long as fifteen years, and that it is worth around 2.5 billion euros in their industry.

He revealed the recipe for export success, saying that a Croatian product must be innovative and rare in order to be successfully exported. ''The detectors we've developed for monorail trains are unique in the world, they aren't produced by anyone else. So, you need to specialise in something closely and become the best at whatever that something is. This is our philosophy, to be the best in the world in the three niches we deal with,'' Viduka explained, adding that the coronavirus pandemic has brought them some huge problems, especially given the situation in India.

“Our engineers go over there to assemble the products, so they have to go into self-isolation when they return home. That's why we've digitised everything we can and adapted what we can to the maximum. However, at the end of last year, we managed to return to the results we enjoyed back in 2019, which a record year, and by the end of the year we exceeded it, which is an exceptional achievement,'' said the leader of Altpro, Zvonimir Viduka.

He also pointed out that Croatian Government economic and job preservation measures helped to overcome the most difficult period caused by the pandemic and lockdowns.

For more, make sure to check out Made in Croatia.

September the 13th, 2021 - An 87 million kuna renovation for the Podravka office building is set to take place, with a company from the continental Croatian town of Krizevci being ''the chosen ones'' for the job.

As Novac/Vedran Marjanovic writes, Podravka's Supervisory Board approved the Management Board's decision to invest a massive 87.7 million kuna in the renovation of the company's office building, and to conclude a contract with the construction company Radnik (Worker) from Krizevci for the job, the much loved Koprivnica-based company announced yesterday.

The renovation of the Podravka office building includes IT and energy reconstruction, as well as its modernisation. The current Podravka office building was built back in 1979 and hasn't been renovated for practically 42 years.

With this, the reconstruction project, which has been being planned for many years now, has entered the implementation phase, and includes a seven-storey office building, a restaurant, a car park and the surrounding area, Podravka announced, adding that the works will begin on October the 1st this year and will be completed in July 2022.

During this time, according to the announcement of the Koprivnica company, employees whose workplace is in the Podravka office building will be relocated to other locations in the company.

Podravka pointed out that the renovation of the company's office building will be financed from its own sources, without any borrowing involved. They added that the renovation of the Podravka office building is being done in its existing dimensions and that the investment framework is appropriate for a challenging business year with careful cost management.

When it comes to the selection of Radnik d.d. from Krizevci as the contractor, Podravka revealed that three rounds of collecting bids from contractors were conducted and that the selection was based on the project of renovation of the office building prepared by the company Forma-Biro, also from Koprivnica.

The amount of the investment in the renovation of the Podravka office building refers to construction works, the mechanical installations, works on the facade and those on the electrical installations, according to the Koprivnica company, noting that the renovation project incorporates elements of material artistic value of the building.

The reconstruction of the office building, Podravka noted, will improve the company's energy efficiency, corporate and information security and ensure that the new requirements of the prescribed standards are met in the time after the coronavirus pandemic.

For more, follow our business section.

September the 11th, 2021 - The Croatian company Holosys develops and manufactures advanced electrical devices which are based on NB-IOT (narrowband Internet of Things) for the remote reading of energy consumption. They're present in as many as fifty countries around the world.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Darko Bicak writes, as of this week, they have added the largest country in the world - Russia - to their already impressive list of their export markets. Namely, the Croatian company Holosys performed at the EcwaTech 2021 fair at the beginning of the week, the largest event in the water industry in Russia, and clearly caught many an eye.

“It was our first step into this enormous market and we're pleased to be able to present our solutions to all visitors, both from Russia and abroad. We've established contact with numerous utility companies and system integrators from this part of the world and we're continuing with more talks about specific projects. As always, making new contacts means new learning opportunities and opportunities for growth,'' they said from Holosys.

As Tomislav Lekic, CEO of the Croatian company Holosys, explained, they're entering the Russian market with new technology that is beginning to be applied in various economic sectors, and interest is growing due to a number of advantages - better signal coverage, reliable data delivery, savings for utilities and companies. Holosys independently develops, manufactures and supplies the NB-IoT Bridge and the NB-IoT Pulse Reader P1-N, modules that enable connection to the telecom operator's NB-IoT networks.

The company has been doing business with numerous companies and utility companies across Croatia for fifteen years now, while worldwide they work with established manufacturers of telemetry equipment, system integrators and utility companies. Their solutions are in more than 500,000 measures of water and gas consumption in the world.

All these experiences are built into the development and improvement of the NB IoT system, and according to Director Lekic, the Croatian company Holosys' NB-IoT device can connect up to five metres at once, so less equipment is needed to establish a stable transmission of readings.

''The ideal scenario for the implementation of the solution includes a module that connects to the consumption measures, and which connects to the mobile network through which it sends the collected data. The data is then displayed via software and can be analysed at a remote location.

The devices are extremely durable and can operate at temperatures from -20 to +80 degrees Celsius, the battery lasts up to ten years, depending on the frequency of sending the consumption data, and the devices have IP68 protection against water penetration,'' explained Lekic.

They further explained from the Croatian company Holosys that utilities and companies get a long-term and reliable solution for secure data transfer, and it is possible to implement it where the standard mobile signal fails to reach, so it is ideal for rural areas and underground infrastructure. Implementation, they claim, is simple, and as the infrastructure is significantly simplified, meaning that maintenance costs are kept low.

''With the implementation of NB-IoT, utility companies gain access to the real-time monitoring of their distribution network, and in the event of a breakdown or leak, they can react much faster and as such work to reduce losses. They also get the infrastructure through which end users can access an application that sounds an alarm in the event of a pipe burst and provides information on excessive customer consumption,'' concluded the director.

For more, make sure to check out Made in Croatia.

September the 10th, 2021 - The Zagreb Disquorse company has launched, as its founders claim, a well-known unique, digital solution that quickly drives organisational agility.

As Novac/Jozo Vrdoljak writes, this Croatian company's solution is a simple desktop application (app) that combines smart technology, business-relevant content and an innovative learning method, and is applicable in combination with common video platforms such as Webex, Zoom or Teams.

Disquorse has been launched - a digital solution that prepares organisations to grow more and create added value in their complexity. The solution had its premiere here in the Republic of Croatia, and at the end of the summer it started being used in Germany and in English-speaking countries. It encourages and supports the decentralisation of work, the democratisation of learning and the saving of time in an organisation.

Silke Hermann, who is the co-founder of the Zagreb Disquorse company along with Diana Vetturelli, explained that in a situation in which the number of surprises out there on various markets is growing every day, the need for proper communication among employees and the creation of a common understanding of organisational challenges and problems increases.

"I don't mean fun activities and communication platforms, but a real, focused and well-argued discussion. E-learning platforms, no matter how much they offer a wide range of content, can't solve these problems. One of the problems with classic e-learning offers is that they focus on the individual and primarily on the transfer of knowledge to the individual. And yes, that's necessary, but it is nowhere near close enough. Organisational learning needs much more than that.

It could almost be said that giving knowledge to individuals is the easier part. The challenge is to create collective knowledge in such a way that it can become a collective ability,'' stated Silke Hermann, who added that it's precisely for this reason that they set themselves the task of devising a solution that would allow people in companies to grapple with content and think about the context.

''The new unit of measurement for learning is a group or a team. People who work closely together and create value ​​together should also have the opportunity to learn together. Learning as a self-determining and self-organising approach and peer exchange, without trainers or moderators, and this is exactly what the disqourse enables. The most important thing is that changes aren't cascaded, which in large companies sometimes takes several years, but all employees can participate at the same time and build the same level of knowledge and mutual understanding,'' pointed out Silke Hermann, adding that disqourse is a European solution for the whole world.

Silke Hermann is otherwise the German author of an international business bestseller on the topic of complexity and organisation of the future, and the inventor of social technologies.

"The research we've been conducting since back in 2018 has shown that for now there is nothing similar in the world, and the need for a new approach is growing every day. What makes me especially happy is that we've decided to establish a company of the same name right here in Croatia and from here encourage organisational changes around the world,'' explained Silke Hermann.

Diana Vetturelli explained that when you ask six board members about the concept of agility and a more agile way of working and why such things are needed you will get six different answers. ''How then can we ever expect the remaining 30, 100 or 3,000 employees to have the same level of understanding or to be able to prepare for market competition and create added value. With the increased advent of teleworking, these shortcomings have become even more pronounced, and the possibility of encouraging change has only slowed down.

Croatian companies were the first in the world to test out the Zagreb Disquorse company's creation, but in the meantime we've also got have clients in Switzerland and Germany. It is currently being implemented by financial and energy sector organisations that are in the process of introducing organisational agility, but the Swiss client is one city whose interest is to prepare its administration for a new dynamic era and a decentralised way of working.

As the product was launched in late February, several customers are still in the implementation phase of the first cycle. Namely, groups of 4-6 employees go through one thematic cycle through 5 sessions lasting 90 minutes each and have a break of 7-14 days between each session. As early as September, we're starting a global business. In addition to English, German and Croatian, which have all been in use since February, we're ready to supply the Spanish, Portuguese, French and Korean-speaking markets this week, and we have established cooperation with six partner companies in Austria, Brazil, Canada, Korea and Germany. and Peru,'' concluded Diana Vetturelli.

The premiere in Croatia will take place in October at the Comeleon conference, when the Zagreb Disquorse company's project will be available to the general public for the first time.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.

September the 6th, 2021 - The Zagreb company Take Natural Juice started out as a concept store after a family decided to adopt a more healthy way of life a decade ago. It has since caught the interest of many and exceeded its previously expected results.

As Ivan Tominac/Poslovni Dnevnik writes, health, they say, is the greatest wealth one can have, and nutrition is an important part of our daily lives that allows us to have better health and an easier time in general, both physically and mentally.

The Zagreb company Take Natural Juice is also producing a healthier alternative to fruit juices, and a conversation with the owner Sanja Dajak Matanovic revealed the fact that everything started out with a family that deciced to switch to a more healthy lifestyle more than ten years ago.

It started with the opening of a concept store with a professional kitchen in which these juices were produced, and after receiving good feedback from their customers, the whole concept took on new proportions and became a business that the whole family is very proud of.

Health and improving the quality of life were, therefore, the main motives for starting the business behind the Zagreb company Take Natural Juice.

“We offer cold-pressed juices without the addition of sugar, artificial sweeteners, water, colour enhancers, preservatives and a kind of chemistry in general. We currently offer six types of standardised cold-pressed juices (fresh and short-term pasteurised), two types of lemonades, three types of wellness shooters and four types of smoothies,'' explained Dajak Matanovic.

Given that this business story exceeded their expected results, investments were a logical sequence of activities, and although they had inquiries about the sale of shares in the company, nothing like that is in their focus at the moment. An investment of 10,000 euros was spent on equipping a professional kitchen, as well as on obtaining basic professional furniture and machinery. According to Dajak Matanovic, the plan is to withdraw funds from EU funds in the next step.

“Our juices are all cold pressed from first class vegetables and fruits and retain up to 25 percent of their fiber. Our fresh juices have a shelf life of five days, which is achieved by perfect microbiology and extreme caution and hygienic perfectionism in the production process. The pasteurised juices are processed by the method of fast pasteurisation (HTST) which allows a shelf life of up to two months, depending on the glass or plastic packaging, but the juices still belong to the fresh product category,'' said the owner of the Zagreb company Take Natural Juice.

All of the conditions that need to be met in order for their juices to be called healthy are, as he pointed out, the challenges they face in production. Each step in production takes months of reading, researching and searching for options for machines and production means. While difficult, they're successfully coping with this.

Most of their raw materials come from domestic producers and distributors, but depending on the season and what is available, they sometimes do go beyond the borders of Croatia to get their hands on good raw materials.

“There's no small supplier or family farm that could supply us with a sufficient amount of necessary raw materials all year round, but we have a successful and long cooperation with some of them. Organic chokeberry, for example, comes from Croatia all year round, it's more or less the same for apples too, but the origin of the oranges we use depends on the season, and for example, pineapple, ginger and similar foods, which aren't grown in our climate, are regularly imported.

We use first class vegetables and fruits in our production, and any visible damage to any of it is physically removed. Only completely healthy foods enter the juices,'' added Dajak Matanovic.

Their entire production is currently located in Zagreb, in the western part of the city, and their production facilities extend in size to 120 square metres. They have no stocks or long-term storage, they're very flexible and they have adapted their team to that, which varies from 5 to 10 people per shift, depending on the size of their orders.

For more, make sure to check out Made in Croatia.

September the 2nd, 2021 - The Osijek software company Mono isn't a new player on the ever blossoming ''field'' of Croatian software developers and companies, in fact it has been a market leader in the field of eCTD software for some time now.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Suzana Varosanec writes, for years, the Osijek software company Mono has been one of the market leaders in the field of eCTD software, a standard used in the pharmaceutical industry when submitting information to regulatory agencies. Back in pandemic dominated 2020, they still excelled, managing to generate a massive 39.6 million kuna in revenue, while profit after tax amounted to 18.8 million kuna and accounted for 47 percent of their revenue.

This autumn, they plan to move into a new office building in their home base of Osijek, and according to the management team, Mono is "a strong company for the development of complex software systems with an emphasis placed on its own products that use advanced technologies."

When looking at other Croatian companies which did well despite the dire economic circumstances of 2020, the most successful long-term enterprise in 2020 is Zagreb's Spectra Media, while the most successful new enterprise is Sedam arhitektura, also based in the City of Zagreb.

The first gas company (Prvo plinarstvo drustvo) is the most successful enterprise in terms of total revenue in 2020, Zagrebacka banka the most successful bank, and Rimac Automobili is, rather unsurprisingly, the fastest growing company in 2020.

PPK Valpovo is the winner of the Golden Balance for 2020 in agriculture, forestry and fishing, Radlovac from Orahovica in mining and quarrying, HS Produkt from Karlovac in manufacturing, HEP is the winner for electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supplies, Zagreb's Spectra Media (aforementioned) for water supply; wastewater disposal, waste management and environmental remediation, and the Velika Gorica-based company Lapor for construction.

For wholesale and retail trade; the repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles, the winner is Zagreb's Peek & Cloppenburg, for transport and storage, Rijeka's Jadranska vrata, and for providing accommodation and food preparation and serving, Global Food Zagreb (which runs the wildly popular McDonald's restaurants).

For more, make sure to check out our dedicated business section.

September the 2nd, 2021 - The Zagreb company Arosa Grande, which specialises in the design and manufacturing of prefabricated (prefab) buildings, hasn't faced any serious issues as a result of the pandemic, the epidemiological measures or even the earthquakes which struck back in 2020, a rise in iron prices has been and continues to be a thorn in their side.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Darko Bicak writes, Zoran Krstovski, Arosa Grande's director, explained that about 40-50 percent of the total construction costs of their facilities fall on galvanised pipes, which have become the most expensive of all the materials they require.

"Last year, the price of galvanised pipes, which are six cm in diameter and which we mostly use, was 5.7 kuna per kilogram, and today it costs more than 17 kuna. This has made our business very difficult because it's now hard to estimate what the total investment costs will actually turn out to be.

We used to make offers that were valid for one month, and now those offers have been reduced to a mere seven days. In addition, in order to avoid unwanted situations and costs with clients, we accept jobs and sign contracts only for those projects that we can implement with the material we currently have in stock,'' said Krstovski. He hopes that the price of iron will stabilise eventually and come back down to a more realistic level, because the current situation is causing very serious problems in business operations and planning for many companies, whether they sell iron or buy it.

The value of a project carried out by the Zagreb company Arosa Grande pusually depends on the customer's own individual requirements, and so far, their largest individual job has come with the enormous price tag of 970,000 euros, while one project amounting to 1.3 million kuna is currently under construction.

As Ivan Djodj, the owner and founder of the company explained, when he founded the Zagreb company Arosa Grande way back in 2008, his first idea was to create products that would help farmers protect their hay bales from rotting under different weather conditions.

He therefore wanted to devise something that would be airy enough to preserve the quality of the hay, and yet firm enough and long-lasting to be able to withstand years of sun, wind, rain, and snow. With that, Arosa Grande's very best-selling and most sought-after product was created - a tunnel canopy for hay.

"A simple calculation says that farmers who store their hay bales in such facilities annually save about 150 euros per head on livestock feed because the food retains many nutrients that would otherwise disappear. There's also an ecological aspect to it. The usual way of covering a roll of hay with nylon is very harmful to the environment. The foil with which the bales were covered is decomposed by the wind and rain. Torn pieces of plastic foil fly everywhere, and a good amount of those pieces of plastic would end up plowed up in the fields.

As is well known, nylon takes more than one hundred years to break down and decompose, so the plastic plowed into the soil slowly releases toxic chemicals, which also reach rivers, lakes and the sea. The soil is then no longer suitable for organic farming and due to the cessation of oxygen flow, which makes it become infertile. During the decomposition process itself, microscopic poisonous particles are formed which then eventually penetrate into the food chain,'' explains Djodj.

Very quickly, the Zagreb company Arosa Grande expanded its range of products to canopies for storing and drying wood, and then came other products - multi-purpose warehouses for storing agricultural machinery, raw materials, work machines, devices, vehicles and more, and then barns for livestock and other animals.

As Krstovski pointed out, to date, they have designed and installed more than 1,000 facilities across Croatia, Slovenia, Austria, Germany, Slovakia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Arosa Grande has its own design and commercial, while everything else is done through subcontractors. This is reflected in the fact that they have two to three employees and about 30 subcontractors, with their annual revenue being slightly less than 10 million kuna in total.

For more, make sure to follow our dedicated business section.

September the 2nd, 2021 - The Golden Key Awards are upon us, and with the horrendous pandemic dominated year of 2020 quite comfortably behind us, we can look at how Croatian companies performed under the most dire of economic circumstances. These are the best Croatian exporters of 2020.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Darko Bicak writes, Koncar - Distributive and special transformers/Distributivni i specijalni transformatori was named the best of the large Croatian exporters for last year. The Golden Key Award, which is being awarded for the fourteenth time in a row, was presented to them at the sixteenth annual convention of the Croatian Exporters' Association which was held in Zagreb on Wednesday.

In the category of medium-sized Croatian exporters, the winner was the astonishing Infobip from the Istrian town of Vodnjan, while the software company Axilis, which develops online betting platforms, was declared the laureate among micro and small companies.

''Croatian exporters are a shining example of the Croatian economy, but they are forced to work in much worse conditions than official statistics show and we must be concerned about that,'' said Darinko Bago, the president of the Croatian Exporters' Association at the Convention of this interest group.

"As this is a turning point, a year full of crisis, 2020 was problematic for most companies, and all comparisons of business and exports are made with pre-pandemic 2019. Back in 2019, there was a decline in exports compared to the year before. We recorded a drop in trade by 11 percent and services by 20 percent. The reason for this is the bipolar world, which, in addition to having a political plan, also has great implications for the economy. Now, the situation with Afghanistan has reignited and we're yet to see how it will affect the global economy," Bago warned.

Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development, Tomislav Coric, said that for small and open economies, such as that boasted by the Republic of Croatia, exports are a prerequisite for development and basic survival.

"Croatian GDP has been growing for years, and lately, exports have been one of the main factors in economic growth and economic recovery. Exports even recorded very good results in 2020, because although numbers did fall, they fell much less than the general GDP did. This year alone, we're recording a large recovery in exports with numbers like 60 billion kuna, which is 11 billion kuna more than in the pre-crisis 2019 ", said Coric, added that we must be careful in this analysis of the growth of the value of exports, because part of it is related to global inflation.

For more, make sure to follow our dedicated business section.

August the 30th, 2021 - The Croatian company Mi-Plast has a five billion euro solution for plastic waste up its sleeve which could save the a lot of time and money in the future.

As Novac/Vedran Marjanovic writes, Jelena Miketa from the Croatian company Mi-Plast, based in Rijeka, says that she considers it to only be a matter of time before this type of technology comes to life throughout Europe and the rest of the world.

This Rijeka company, with its close cooperation with Spanish partners, has developed a new technology for the decomposition of plastic - Ecometilal. Starting from the fact that within the European Union alone, a quarter of plastic waste ends up in landfills, these Croatian and Spanish partners launched the developmental phase of the Ecometilala project back in 2016 from European Union funds, which was all concluded back in March this year.

"The total research budget of Ecometilal stood at two million euros, and the results of the project showed that the combination of gasification and synthesis is sustainable for recycling plastic waste of a complex composition from different sources," said a report on the topic.

After the completion of the research, the next step is to offer this technology to the economy, and in support of the assessment from the beginning of the text, Jelena Miketa has cited some concrete examples of market interest in Ecometilal.

''Our Spanish partner in the project, Blue Plasma Power, the owner of the KHGP technology patent, is already in negotiations with European investors who see a lot of potential, so the plan is to construct an industrial space in Spain over the next few years, and there are also stakeholders from Saudi Arabia,'' revealed Mi-Plast's Jelena, which is otherwise a family company owned by Davorin Miketa Petek.

The Croatian company Mi-Plast was moved back in 1991 from Banja Luka to Rijeka, and since 1993, it has been engaged in the production, distribution and recycling of polyethylene packaging used in industry, households, construction, agriculture and tourism.

When asked if other Croatian companies are interested in Ecometilal technology, Jelena Miketa said that several companies in the country have expressed interest and support.

''Here in Croatia, support was given to the entire project team and the idea of ​​a new type of chemical recycling of waste, which results in the creation of a new eco-product for a wider purpose. However, Croatian companies still suspect that the initial investment is too expensive, and the procedure is too complicated, and that the initial incentive should come from government agencies that will recognise the long-term benefits for Croatia in the technology of the Ecometilala project,'' she explained.

The aforementioned interest of the state in encouraging the production and use of methyl for the decomposition of plastics stems, among other things, comes from the fact that back in January this year, the Council of the European Union began to apply the relevant EU directive on such waste in landfills.

According to Jelena Miketa, the aforementioned tax amounts to 800 euros per tonne of unrecycled plastic waste, and given the fact that here in Croatia, about 40 thousand tonnes of such packaging is disposed of in landfills, the tax liability of the country for non-recycled plastic waste would amount to a massive 32 million euros per year.

''The estimated value of the use of Ecometilal and the annual operating cost are approximately several times less than the amount by which the EU would additionally tax Croatia for its plastic waste,'' commented Jelena.

Given the additional taxation and other costs of disposing of non-recycled plastics, the estimate of a 5 billion euro market for the Croatian company Mi-Plast's Ecometilal technology seems quite reasonable indeed.

''The application of methyl is wide and diverse in the chemical, pharmaceutical, cosmetic and petroleum industries. These industries consume most of the methyl due to the low level of toxicity, the high dissolution power and low viscosity,'' explained Jelena, adding that this is applicable not only as a solvent, but also as a chemical reagent, a base material, as well as as a substitute for other types of solvents in various chemical processes.

''Methylal is also used as a special purpose fuel, as an additive to gasoline fuel. In any case, what's crucial is that the raw material from which this high-potential and widely applicable chemical product is obtained is waste, more precisely, that waste that can't really be recycled by conventional recycling methods, so such waste usually ends up in landfills,'' said Jelena.

Waste that can be used in plants developed by the Croatian company Mi-Plast and its Spanish partners includes, inter alia, multilayer food packaging, heavily soiled packaging, plastic from electrical and electronic devices containing inorganic materials for strength and insulating properties, and plastic from the automotive industry that comes combined with foam, sponge and other textiles.

For more on Croatian companies, make sure to check out our dedicated business section.

August the 28th, 2021 - The Croatian agritech Agrivi startup has entered into a partnership with CGES Group, which will strengthen its position on the African market.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Marta Duic writes, the CGES group was looking for a digital solution for its clients from the agri-food industry over in Africa, and after the selection of the Agrivi startup through a new partnership, they plan to work together on projects to digitise agricultural production management in that part of the world.

''Agrivi's software is available worldwide, even in Africa, but through this collaboration, users will also receive support out in the field as the local presence will be further strengthened. Agrivi's shared knowledge and experience of digital agricultural solutions through a local partner will make it even more accessible in this area.

Through local activities, the partner will been shown all of the advantages for the digitalisation of agriculture, and we'll be able to help further develop agribusiness companies in South Africa by transforming and improving processes in agriculture and the food industry,'' they stated from the Croatian Agrivi startup.

The primary problems faced by African farmers are productivity and efficiency in achieving profitable and sustainable agricultural production, as well as stepping further afield, out into the global market.

They pointed out from the Agrivi startup that through monitoring the situations at hand with their digital tools, that farmers can simplify the certification process and facilitate market access. It's worth mentioning that the Croatian Agrivi startup operates across more than a hundred countries around the world, and their software solution is localised in a dozen foreign languages.

They have offices here in the Republic of Croatia, as well as in other European countries such as Poland, Romania and the United Kingdom. Through partners they are also present in South America, Africa and Asia, and in addition to Europe, their focus is also on the US market.

Global recognition

“Through workshops, seminars and conferences, we educate people about the digitalisation of agriculture and what the benefits for all stakeholders are, from farmers, companies to the end consumers. This summer, we also received recognition from the Food and Agriculture Organisation, which ranked the Agrivi startup among the finalists in the category of software for agricultural production management as part of the Digital Excellence in Agriculture event,'' they concluded from Agrivi.

For more, make sure to check out our dedicated business section.