The Development of the Georgia Creative Industries Research and Evidence Framework (Georgia CI REF)
The Development of the Georgia Creative Industries Research and Evidence Framework (Georgia CI REF) project comes at an important time for Georgia as the country re-frames its approach to culture and the creative economy, with ambitious plans to grow capacity, drive innovation and deliver inclusive growth.
Commissioned with the support of the British Council, Tom Fleming Creative Consultancy (TFCC)1 has worked alongside Creative Georgia, and key partners across the Creative Industries in Georgia on the development of this Georgia CI REF.
The focus of the Georgia CI REF project is to provide a structured and robust approach to creative industries policy and investment. Through consultations with a range of strategic stakeholders across the Georgian Creative Industries (and wider cultural, social and economic policy landscape), the project also aims to:
- Increase recognition of the role of culture and the creative industries in social and economic welfare.
- Encourage sector representatives in Georgia to work towards a Research and Evidence Framework outlining the needs of creative sub sectors as well as the creative industries sector as a whole. This includes the links between cultural activities which were traditionally state-led and financed and an increasingly mixed economy of public / private activities
- Raise the awareness of the importance of systematic data collection in strategic planning, project management, etc.
- Review existing research and data and support the collection and analysis of additional research data on the creative industries.
- Facilitate capacity building of creative sector representatives in systematic data collection, research and evidence collection.
The project builds on work which the British Council in Georgia facilitated in 2021, when TFCC collaborated with Creative Georgia and the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport of Georgia in the research skills development project for creative industries mapping. This previous project highlighted the need for a Creative Industries Research and Evidence Framework to provide an overarching structure for systemic research and data collection and to start to address the current lack of data and intelligence on the creative industries and wider creative economy in Georgia.