The Cornish marine industry is set to benefit from a new £771,682 project that will help small and medium marine businesses become more competitive and address issues preventing their growth.
Propel Cornwall will be holding a series of information sessions around the county over the next few weeks, so businesses can come along to see how the project will be able to benefit them.
The project will give mentoring and grant support to marine businesses to improve areas of their business activity, which may include: measuring and improving productivity, implementing new systems and products, improving marketing and digital knowledge and insights, increasing quality, improving supplier management, managing change, growing outputs and increasing staff and skills.
Sam Winters – marine innovation mentor with Propel Cornwall, said: “We’re excited to have this new opportunity to support Cornwall’s marine businesses.
“We will work closely with owner managers to identify which area(s) of their business are a priority for improvement, then use our expertise to help them find solutions. If we need to purchase specialist help there is grant support available. This is an exciting new opportunity to help our marine businesses grow.”
Paul Wickes, CEO of Cornwall Marine Network (CMN), added: “As a county we are rightly proud of our marine heritage with our expertise and processes being adopted in many businesses around the globe and as a sector, we still continue to grow.
“Cornwall remains home to some of the most innovative, cutting edge and forward thinking marine businesses and this new project from CMN will provide services and expertise that ensure we maintain this momentum of growth to the benefit of the local marine sector and the wider Cornish economy.”
There are more than 700 small and medium sized marine businesses in Cornwall who employ more than 10,000 people, generating £345 million to the GDP of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. Cornwall is home to one in seven of the UK’s marine sector business base.
