EU funding helped German firm CRM float new ideas, thanks to the Enterprise Europe Network.

There are beauty secrets hidden in seaweed, according to Dr Peter Krost. The biologist set up his CRM company in Kiel, a small German town on the edge of the Baltic Sea. He and his partner Dr Levent Piker grow organic algae and use its extracts in cosmetic products.

“We wanted to develop a method of aquaculture that was sustainable environmentally but which could also result in good quality, marketable goods,” Dr Krost explains. But even though his algae products are completely organic, he could not label them as such because organic aquaculture was not recognised.

To fill this gap, Dr Krost launched a project to develop a method to create ecological certification for products from organic aquaculture.
The company wanted to apply for funding for this idea under the EU’s environment fund, the Life+ programme. But preparing a proposal, finding suitable partners and dealing with the paperwork was daunting for a small business with just 12 employees.

The company found a lifeline in its local Enterprise Europe Network branch, based in Kiel’s Investitionsbank Schleswig-Holstein. Network experts Cornelia Pankratz and Annegret Meyer-Kock advised on the application and helped secure local co-funding.

To Dr Krost’s delight, CRM’s proposal was successful. The project, ECOSMA, will implement a process for the ecological certification of products from sustainable and organic aquaculture.