This project will implement policies to stimulate small retail businesses by providing support to the initiatives being taken to this end by local governments. The project will also assess the status of retail business throughout the region and collect data to measure the health of these businesses and the impact that of initiatives being taken.

This project fits within the broader framework of the adaptation of retail business to new consumer trends. The goal is for local stores and restaurants to continue to form part of the backbone of society and to play a key role in the creation of employment in local municipalities.

This initiative will result in a tool painting a detailed picture of commercial activity in the metropolitan area. The tool will consist of a data base featuring information on the various retail sectors and their presence in local municipalities. The information will be searchable by type of product, with food shops considered in a special category.

It is worth noting that, as a starting point for the project, a rigorous and exhaustive analysis of the region's retail ecosystem was conducted in order to determine the status of the nearly 130,000 businesses in this sector in the area.

Meanwhile, a report has offered a broader perspective on how new trends are affecting retail businesses and, more specifically, on the challenges faced by the retail sector in the metropolitan area. The study was done within the framework of the AMB's TROP programme (Trends, Challenges, Opportunities and Positioning). The report was drafted with the help of Institut Cerdà, and is divided into four sections: context of the sector, analysis of the role of the roles of the various players in the sector in the supply chain, identification of trends and studies of successful cases, detection of challenges and needs to be met.