The ANIMA network has developed two key activities since mid-2002:

• A platform for linking economic actors from Europe and the Mediterranean around targeted sectors and themes. More than 5,000 SMEs, 500 finance professionals, 1,200 economic development actors have been involved to-date in the Invest in Med programme.
• A resource centre, which is a set of tools to help actors interested in the development and financing of SMEs in the Mediterranean. The "ANIMA resource centre for investment in the Mediterranean" targets SMEs and large industrial groups, economic development agencies, financial actors and innovation networks wishing to develop activities in direction of the MED-13 (9 South and East-Mediterranean countries, plus Turkey, Libya, Malta and Cyprus).
   

It meets three key needs:
1. Perform an active and selective monitoring on countries and key sectors in the Mediterranean (qualified and continuous business intelligence using over 150 selected information sources)
2. Identify key stakeholders as well as investment and partnerships opportunities
3. Connect with stakeholders, business events or partnership projects

The tools are as follow:

• MIPO www.anima.coop

The MIPO observatory (Mediterranean Investment Project Observatory) registers every foreign direct investment (FDI) and partnership project (JV, franchises, technological cooperation or commercial representative offices, stores etc.), which involve the Southern Mediterranean countries. Since 2003, it has identified more than 4,000 FDI and 1,000 partnerships.

• Med Maps www.medmaps.eu

Online mapping system that lets you view and position in real time the attractive economic activity zones in Mediterranean countries as well as all the FDI and partnership projects registered in the ANIMA-MIPO observatory.

• Document database, available on www.anima.coop

A series of 43 documents to help enterprises and business support organisations: sectors studies to identify opportunities, guides to facilitate the establishment in the South of the Mediterranean,
economic data, directories of key actors, etc.

• Agenda Med www.agendamed.biz

Agenda Med, the Mediterranean business events calendar (more than 1,000 registered events), is a free and unique tool which enables users to identify, plan and promote business events in the
Mediterranean. Each event has a qualification allowing simple searches (by industry, type of event, country). Email alerts inform you of new events based on your selected criteria.

• Link in Med www.linkinmed.biz

Link in Med is the 1st online Mediterranean business community. It already counts 4,000 members, including 3,500 enterprises. This online directory brings together the companies registered in the ANIMA-MIPO observatory, companies involved in the Invest in Med programme and new candidates.Each organisation has a fact sheet that contains, in addition to its profile, its recent investments and its latest business opportunities.