IHMEC Project Exports Indoor Hygiene Expertise to Saudi Arabia
With the IHMEC project coordinated by the University of Turku, the expertise clusters of three countries in the Baltic Sea region are aiming to enter into the construction market in the Middle East.
The delegation of the project met with the Ambassador of Finland in Saudi Arabia Antti Rytövuori (in the middle) at Riyadh on 14 October 2018.
During the visit, Finnish indoor hygiene expertise and the IHMEC project were presented to the Ambassador of FInlnad in Saudi Arabia. The project aims to enter into the construction market in the Middle East by offering unique solutions to preventing global spreading of harmful infections.
– Finns are pioneers in issues relating to indoor hygiene: the Pori unit of Turku School of Economics and Satakunta University of Applied Sciences have studied solutions that improve indoor hygiene in collaboration with their extensive business network since 2012, says Project Manager Tiina Mäkitalo-Keinonen from Turku School of Economics at the University of Turku.
Saudi Arabia is undertaking a large health care reform which is a part of the more extensive Saudi Vision 2030. One of the main goals of the vision is to increase the number of pilgrims from the current 8 million to 30 million by 2030. Reaching this goal requires better competence in preventing infectious diseases and the IHMEC project can meet this need.
The indoor hygiene guidelines that have been developed earlier are a central part of the export of expertise that aims at initiating collaboration with the Saudi operators.
The support of the Embassy of Finland is important in creating a contact network in Saudi Arabia. The IHMEC project includes a Finnish cluster in indoor hygiene, a Swedish materials cluster, and an Estonian wood and modular building cluster.
The IHMEC project that started in March 2018 is partly funded by the Interreg Central Baltic programme of the European Union.
>>IHMEC project’s website
Mariikka Whiteman
Translation: Mari Ratia