Sílvia Martí, Vice-President of Corporate, Internal and Institutional Communication of Moventia, took part in the “Culture as a Catalyst for the Economy” meeting held at the Círculo Ecuestre with support from the Catalunya Cultura Foundation. 

The event highlighted the importance of culture as a fundamental factor in boosting the economy and creating jobs and wealth. Sílvia Martí was very adamant about this, saying that “culture is a driving force for investment and enhances our reputation as a country. Unfortunately however, the level of investment is far below the European average”.

In saying this, she was referring to the figures on public investment in culture in Spain, which currently stands at 1.2% of the budget with an impact on Spanish GDP of 3.4%, while this impact is 4.7% in Europe.

During the debate, Sílvia Martí also expressed her concern over the foreseeable difficulty to be encountered by culture companies – especially the smaller ones – in accessing Next Generation funds to enable them to finance key projects in their sector. “I am very interested to know how this will happen, when and what the deadlines will be. The culture sector is suffering tremendously and, if the public authorities do not take an interest, we will continue to have a serious problem in the world of culture”.

Agreement on this came from everyone else taking part in the round table discussion moderated by Georgina Ferri, CEO of the ARA newspaper, and featuring Ramón Agenjo, Vice-President of the Damm Foundation; Anna Gener, CEO for Barcelona of Savills Aguirre Newman; and Eusebio Güell, President of the Güell Foundation. They all agreed on the urgent need for a country like Spain to approve a Patronage Act, one of the central issues in cultural policy over the last decade and which seeks to incentivise donations of private capital for cultural activities.