An 'Office of Local Entrepreneurship' has been created by Silves council and it opens on the 18th of November.
"This new service aims to create an enabling economic environment for business activities in the county, to have a targeted approach for quick responses to the needs of entrepreneurs, businesses and investors in various areas, including information advice and monitoring related to national and Community funds," read the council statement.
According to the municipality, the new office seeks to 'promote individual relationships with entrepreneurs and investors, to provide all the information on all available support, and to promote contact with public or private institutions so as to support local producers in boosting their activities.'
The staff running this bureau will be able 'to advise on the current legislation, criteria and procedures to access EU and other funding programmes.'
The bureau's birth happily coincides with Portugal 2020 which sees €270 million made available in EC grants to businesses across the nation, but only 7% allocated to the Algarve.
Silves has a deserved reputation as being one of the Algarve's least helpful councils when it comes to those wishing to establish businesses within the council area.
The new Silves bureau seems from the information received today to concentrate on advising people on how to access grants and free money from those institutions willing to send it.
It also would be of inestimable benefit for the council to set up a one stop bureau to sort out the interminable bureaucratic delays and deliberate tangles that this council traditionally has deployed to thwart and frustrate those willing to set up and run businesses in the Silves area. This is the reality, more grants are only part of the answer.
