“Factoría de Cohesión”, different actions towards the same goal: to integrate the port and the city of Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Interview with Alberto Dieter Graeff, Delegate of the Presidency, Factoría de Cohesión Factoría de Cohesión is a young organization created in 2015, in Santa Cruz de Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain). Their main mission is to foster greater social, economic, environmental and spatial integration between city and port. Their main supporters are the port authority and the municipality of Santa Cruz de Tenerife. At the same time, they also collaborate with several public regional organizations, including universities and cultural and business associations. Since it was created, Factoría de Cohesión has developed an intense agenda of activities, combining port and urban interests. These activities are aligned with several goals of the Agenda AIVP 2030 for sustainable City Port relationships. In this interview with Alberto Dieter Graeff, we will get to know them better, their origin, the motivation of the team and their current initiatives. AIVP – First of all, we would like to know how and why you decided to create La Factoría de Cohesión, how did it start and who is the young team behind this exceptional initiative in Spain? Alberto Dieter Graeff - Delegate of the Presidency, Factoría de Cohesión The idea of creating La Factoría emerges from the general feeling and need of local inhabitants of Santa Cruz of living more connected to the sea. Our city was born from the sea and it remains its essence. As years went by, the port took land from the areas where there was the better sea access. La Factoría simply tries to respond to the general desire of integrating city and port that has emerged among neighbours and members of the port community. AIVP – Your main sponsors are the Port authority and the Municipality. However, your activities are related or even overlap with the initiatives these two organizations are also developing (e.g. port cultural events or educational activities). How do you manage this relationship? Alberto Dieter Graeff – The relationship of La Factoría with the Municipality and the Port authority is the result of a common project developed by both entities, which converge in the projects that we develop. For us, is clear that our mission is to contribute to the City Port relationship in Santa Cruz. For example, we collaborated in the organization of Fiestas del Carmen (popular local festivities), that are a great tradition in Santa Cruz and usually had two parallel programs, one from the Port authority and one from the Municipality. Our job was to achieve a common festivities program, as it happened in 2018, strengthening the link between port and city. AIVP – One of the main topics for La Factoría’s is the Blue Economy. What initiatives are you currently developing to encourage the Blue Economy in Tenerife? How have you contacted the companies operating in this sector? Alberto Dieter Graeff –…