Project Summary

The forest-based and related industries (F-BI) are among the most important sectors in the European Union, representing some 10% of the EU's manufacturing industries and present in all EU Member States, offering direct employment to some 3 million people. Its activity is based on raw material resources that are renewable and on efficient recycling. The sectors of F-BI are characterised by a high majority of SMEs with insufficient resources to follow and grab the opportunities offered by FP6. "Translators" and "stimulators" are needed to trigger this potential, like the partners of the proposed ETI project. The main objective of this project is to stimulate, encourage and facilitate the participation of SMEs of the F-BI in the European FP6, with a particular focus on the New Instruments.

WOODISM focuses on whole sector of wood and wood industry, as these consist of interrelated sectors, each of them having a considerable influence on the performance of the others. A profound knowledge of the nature of these interdependencies and the ability to translate them into clear analyses of the consequences, at industrial, cluster and societal level constitutes the reason of the big number of partners. Thanks to the 12 partner countries the dissemination and cooperation in IP and NoE at national and European level can be guaranteed and improved.

In brief, the project includes:

- Technology audits to identify SME needs;
- Actions like matchmaking the identified needs/ applications deriving from IP/NoE/SMEs or SME groupings selected, assisted and trained in the project to create bridges across the research-innovation interface, without forgetting the importance of the dissemination of information;
- Activities to guarantee dissemination of information, which is one of the main components in ETI projects, incl. e.g. development and maintenance of a wood products sector database to support RTD activities in project preparation.