On April 28th 2021, ICT for Kosovo’s Growth organized the Regional B2B meeting in Gjilan where ICT Sector meets Non-ICT Businesses in Development and exporting. The meeting was open to the public and reasonable were were in attendance, always in compliance Anti-Covid measures.

The keynote speaker of the event was mayor of Gjilan mr. Lutfi Haziri, who spoke about a variety of issues impacting industries and the importance of digitalization and the opportunity that these events provide. Mayor also raised the issue of creation of food Institute in Gjilan municipality and support of the Local authorities towards these businesses.

Another speaker was Mr. Agron Namani CEO of “ASK Food” Company of food processing. He gave the credits to a meeting of this kind that creates network and opportunities for cooperation and briefly spoke about the success of his company after integrating elements of technology and digitalization of the equipment.

Short speech was also from representative of The Kosovo Association of Information and Communication Technology (STIKK), Mr. Art Navakazi who presented that STIKK provides a platform that unites technology leaders to connect and collaborate, and it supports members who to propel technology forward.

Following the event, prearranged meetings occurred. In total of 31 bilateral B2B meeting were realised. Attendees shared opinions, thoughts and suggestions for consideration of integrating Information and technology elements into the business of the Agriculture and food production industry that in Gjilan Region is very developed. With the presence of 9 ICT and 10 Production companies, resulted with productive discussions and concrete solutions and proposals that might lead to agreements for cooperation.

All concluded and embraced the need for technology integration in all the production and management system. Consequently, overall implementations have proceeded smoothly and have produced a highly referenceable base that can be leveraged for development and ICT integration.

Participants appreciate the form of meetings that took place. Gave them a sense of comfort to be explicitly asked to walk through the production requirements from ICT perspective and to participate in the process of visualizing how the requirements will be implemented.