The Confederation of National Associations of Tanners of the European Community (COTANCE), the representative body of the European leather industry, held its general assembly on 12 June at the Adoberia Bella, headquarters of the cluster.

COTANCE currently has a Spanish presidency, in the person of Manuel Ríos, and the European leather sector was invited to meet in Igualada, at a session organised by ACEXPIEL (Asociación Española del Curtido) with the collaboration of Leather Cluster Barcelona.

The meeting was attended by members of the tanners’ associations of Italy, Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Spain, represented through ACEXPIEL.

In addition to the assembly, the day featured open sessions with very interesting talks by the Italians Andrea Bertaglio and Gustavo Defeo.

Andrea Bertaglio, a journalist specialising in sustainability, climate change and environmental issues, writes for various newspapers, magazines and websites. A graduate in sociology, for years he has focused his work on the impacts of food production, starting with those related to livestock farming and animal production.

Gustavo Defeo is an Italian-Argentinian chemist with many years of experience in the world of leather and the fashion industry. In 2011, he founded Ars Tinctoria, an analytical and research laboratory in Santa Croce sull’Arno, one of Italy’s most important leather clusters.

Defeo gave a significant presentation comparing the circularity of leather with the synthetic materials that imitate it, demonstrating with scientific data the merits of leather’s circularity compared with almost all the existing alternatives, adding: ‘biobased materials are the inevitable option for the future of the planet. In the coming years they will be an essential condition for remaining on the market. Leather is naturally biobased: our sector must strive to remain among the most sustainable materials by choosing the right products in future article developments’.

COTANCE’s programme at Leather Cluster Barcelona also included visits to various cluster players, specifically to the A3 Leather Innovation Center at the Igualada Campus-UdL, where its director Anna Bacardit led a tour of the facilities and thanked COTANCE members for their support in advancing the Master’s Degree in Leather Engineering towards the Erasmus Mundus Master in Innovative Leather Technology in collaboration with other international universities. Afterwards, the tanners’ water treatment plant (IDR) was visited, where the manager and president of the cluster, Bernat Vilarrubias, shared with those present the challenges for environmental improvement, explaining the project for the regeneration of wastewater and showing the pilot plant that is currently in operation.

Following the day, the international tanners highlighted the value of the great ecosystem of business, educational, scientific and environmental cooperation surrounding the leather industry of Leather Cluster Barecelona.

Leather Cluster Barcelona is an environment of competitive cooperation for promoting cross-cutting, transformative strategic projects with the aim of driving forward the ecosystem of the Catalan leather sector. The cluster is an accredited body within the Catalonia Clusters programme and has the support of Acció.