News BCD

Barcelona participates in an international project to measure design as a factor of economic production and its impact on GDP growth

BCD Barcelona Centre de Disseny and the Barcelona City Council presented last 12nd of June at a press conference the initiative “€Design – Measuring Design Value”, a European project that aims to identify and establish guidelines for measuring design as a factor of economic production and its impact on GDP growth.


The presentation took place at Sala Lluís Companys de l’Ajuntament, and was attended by the deputy mayor of economy, enterprise and employment of the Barcelona City Council, Sònia Recasens; and the president and the managing director of BCD, Pau Herrera and Isabel Roig, who has stressed the importance of an initiative that, at medium term, will be able to demonstrate the relevance of design when promoting the economic growth of countries and regions.

Internacional Projection
€Design counts with the participation of six European partners: BCD Barcelona Design Centre (Spain); Copenhagen Business School (Denmark); Designaustria (Austria); Hungarian Intellectual Property Office (Hungary); SVID Swedish Industrial Design Foundation (Sweden) and the University of Cambridge / Design Management Group (United Kingdom).

This initiative, co-financed by the European Commission, with a budget of one million euro for the completion of the tasks assigned to all six entities, will take approximately two years, during which time the conceptual framework of design in the economic context will be analysed and defined, in order to measure it as a tool for user-centred innovation and as economic factor of production. The objective is to obtain tangible results that demonstrate the importance of design as a crucial element to enhance the innovative capabilities of Europe and increasing economic growth and business competitiveness in the global market.

To achieve this, the €Design project will provide data and recommendations to raise awareness amongst agencies and institutions such as the European Commission, OECD, Eurostat, WIPO, as well as national statistical institutions and organisations devoted to the promotion of design and innovation.

This project is also co-financed by the Spanish Minister of Industry, Energy and Tourism through ENISA, and the  Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth.

A new Manual
A key aim of the €Design project is to change the way design is measured in economic terms in manuals produced by the OECD and Eurostat, such as the Frascati Manual for R+D and the Oslo Manual for innovation. BCD and all the project partners are working to promote the publication of a new manual for design.

Although the project has been launched this year, it was in October 2011 when the proposal was presented to the European Comission within the European Design Innovation Initiative, Joint Actions for non-technological, user-centred innovation. In March 2012, the EC gave the green light to the initiative.  

€Design, in line with the EC Europe 2020 strategy
The objectives of "€Design - Measuring Design Value" are part of the strategy Europe 2020 Innovation Union flagship initiative, a strategic plan approved by the European Commission that includes priorities for medium and long term, such as creating jobs, transforming ideas into jobs as well as initiatives that affect society in various areas as well as  people’ quality of life.

The EC Strategy recognizes design as a key element for innovation that facilitates the transformation of ideas into market products and services tailored to the user, and as a strategic connector that allows the implementation of developments in R&D.

In this sense, the €Design project provide relevant information about new ways to measure design and its impact on the creation of economic value, that will help towards the objectives set by the Europe 2020 strategy.

Channel News

CORE77

DEXIGNER

DEZEEN

DIARIO DESIGN

EL PAÍS / DISEÑADORES

LIGHTECTURE

TREEHUGGER

Related News

Links

Access all links