Report of the Legume Innovation Network workshop in Croatia

The Public Institution for the Development of the Međimurje County REDEA organised a first Legume Innovation Network (LIN) workshop that was held on November 29th 2019. The call for participation in a Croatian Legume Innovation Network was released in 2017. This workshop was organised mainly for members of the Croatian LIN working group that applied, but there was also other producers of bean, soy and peas.

For a more dynamic workshop we invited some other stakeholders involved in the legume value chain. We invited external experts that represent producers, suppliers and processors.

The workshop was divided in two parts. In the first part of the workshop, leading firms from Croatia in legume production/processing gave their presentations. Due to that, representatives from Podravka d.d., TSH d.d., RWA Croatia Ltd. and Vitalis Crop Care Ltd. informed participants about their innovations on the market and their approach to support production and processing of legumes. As we finished our Case Study, our subcontractor, SEEDEV Croatia Ltd. gave an overview of the results.

In the second part of our workshop, we divided our participants in two working groups where we tried to put out the main Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) of Croatian legume value chains from the production and market point of view.

To raise more awereness and to present the TRUE project, we organised a competition in cooking beans. The main dish was military beans (a dish with beans, sausages, spices and vegetables, that soldiers cooked for themselves in the army), since our offices are situated in a former military complex, which is now transformed into the Centre of Knowledge of Međimurje County.

The competition was held parallel to the workshop, so after the working part, everybody joined outside for lunch.  The competition with five teams was big success, because we reach more than 250 people before even the news got published.