The Las Galletas Business Center is a collaboration node between the municipality and the University, an epicenter of training, especially in science and technology, and advice and promotion of entrepreneurship. The anniversary, celebrated in March, revolved around a conference by the economist José Carlos Díez.
The Arona Business Center in Las Galletas celebrates its fourth anniversary this year. More than 1,460 days being the epicenter of advice and training for entrepreneurs and freelancers in the municipality and the South Region.
The anniversary ceremony, held on March 10, was chaired by both the mayor, José Julián Mena, and the rector of the University of La Laguna, Rosa María Aguilar, who were accompanied by the councilor for the Economic Promotion area, Raquel García, and the managing director of the General Foundation of the University of La Laguna, Juan Diego Betancor. The day revolved around a conference by the professor at the University of Alcalá de Henares, José Carlos Díez.
The Business Center was opened in the coastal town in 2018 as a node of interaction between the municipality and the University of La Laguna, an institution that provides advice and a complete training program in science and technology, as well as in entrepreneurship and improvement of competitiveness, all this through an agreement that has been recently renewed.
In this period, between 2018 and 2022, the center has provided almost two thousand advice to SMEs and potential entrepreneurs. It has managed almost two hundred self-employed registrations, has processed 160 grants to promote self-employment, 63 single payments to them, has carried out 63 feasibility plans and has organized more than 140 training sessions aimed at entrepreneurs.
During the start of the pandemic, it also became an important center for information, support and processing of support measures for SMEs and the self-employed launched by the different Administrations, including the Arona City Council.
José Julián Mena: “A reference center in the South Region”
The mayor, José Julián Mena, stressed that “this center has become a reference for the South Region. In recent years it has been growing and has been able to adapt to the needs of SMEs and entrepreneurs to grow and diversify the business fabric of Arona, in addition to promoting training, especially among the youngest, in subjects such as science and technology. An especially key job is the one that has also been carried out in the economic crisis derived from the pandemic.”
Rosa Aguilar: “Not only the university of La Laguna, but of the Canary Islands”
The rector, for her part, explained that “for the University of La Laguna it is important to give back to society everything that it contributes and, in this sense, working for employability and entrepreneurship in initiatives such as this Business Center is a of the best ways to collaborate with local development. Thanks to the work of our General Foundation and the fluid collaboration with the Arona City Council –she added-, we believe that the training and advice provided by this center can make a difference for the people who come to its facilities. In addition, it implies increasing the presence of our institution in an area as strategic as the south of Tenerife, since our vocation is to collaborate, within our possibilities, with all possible municipalities and islands, since we consider that we are not the only university of La Laguna, but at the service of the entire Canary Islands».
Full conference by José Carlos Díez available on the Arona networks
For his part, José Carlos Díez, whose conference is available in full on the Facebook pages of the Arona City Council and Arona Economic Promotion, as well as on the municipal YouTube channel, addressed the economic situation that arises after the pandemic and due to the invasion of Ukraine, with the forecast of a prolonged rise in inflation or a possible rise in interest rates at the level of the euro zone.
The economist addressed the rise in energy prices and also the need for diversification as a key element in exposure to risk.
