Venue: Ege Universitesi Kampusu, Izmir 35100, Turkey
Date: March 7–8, 2024

The kick-off meeting of the ELEGTEC project took place on May 7-8th 2024 at the Conference Room of Ege University, Leather Engineering Department with the presence of 19 attendees at the place and 1 online.

The coordinator of the project opened the meeting with a welcome speech and moderated the meeting following the pre-announced agenda.

The partners forming the Consortium made presentations about their institutions and organizations for the partners to get to know each other personally. Next, M.Mete Mutlu made a presentation about the Implementation & Financial Management of the project based on the presentations presented at the Grant Holders’ Meeting 2024.

Work Packages, Tasks, Deliverables, and Milestones were summarized with a Gannt chart. Then all Work package leaders made presentations about their work packages and showed their plans and they were discussed.

The consortium came together with lunch, coffee breaks and a social dinner. It was pleasing to see the commitment of the partners at the kick-off meeting and it is expected that with this start the project will run successfully, make a difference in the target countries and lead to new collaborations.

Venue: Auditorium drh. H. Soepardjo, Fakultas Peternakan, UGM, Yogyakarta, Indonesia
Date: May 17, 2024

The Focus Group Discussion on Enhancing Sustainable and Green Leather Technology in Indonesia, organized by the Faculty of Animal Science UGM through the Erasmus+ Capacity Building for Higher Education (CBHE) program, took place on May 17, 2024. The FGD was attended by members of ELEGTEC, academics, government officials, and leather tanning industry representatives in Indonesia. The event began with welcoming remarks from Dean of the Faculty of Animal Science,Prof. Budi Guntoro, followed by a speech from Dimos Papakonstantinou (project partner, CRETHIDEV, Greece), and a presentation by the project coordinator Prof. Mehmet Mete Mutlu from EGE University (Turkey) regarding the ELEGTEC Project.

During the FGD, discussions centered around challenges faced by the leather industry in Indonesia, such as technological competitiveness and environmental sustainability, while fostering partnerships and sharing leather tanning technology knowledge.

Prof. Yuny Erwanto, representing the ELEGTEC local coordinator in Indonesia, acknowledged the potential and prospects of the Indonesian leather tanning industry. ELEGTEC also noted the challenges faced by various leather tanning industries, including small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), in addressing technological competitiveness and waste management. He emphasized the need for synchronization between livestock farming, animal slaughter, and leather tanning to ensure the quality of raw hides, enabling better processing and increased export production that boosts foreign exchange.

The hope of result is to establish a foundation for a sustainable and mutually beneficial ecosystem through collaboration between academia and the Indonesian leather tanning industry.