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- Anatolian Agricultural Research Institute Eskisehir (AARI)
- Asociación de Investigación de la Industria Agroalimentaria (AINIA)
- BIONIAN Ltd
- Centre for Research in Agro-food Economics and Development (CREDA)
- Centre Wallon de Recherches Agronomiques (CRA-W)
- COTÈCNICA S.C.C.L.
- ECOCERT
- Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária / Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA)
- Hogeschool Gent / University College Ghent (HOG)
- InfoGrain Miroslaw Marciniak (INFOGRAIN)
- Institute of Agricultural Economics (IAE)
- Institute of Food and Resource Economics (FOI)
- Italian National Institute for Health (ISS)
- NATAÏS SAS
- National Hellenic Research Foundation (NHRF)
- National Institute of Biology (NIB)
- NEOTRON SPA
- Szko?a G?ówna Gospodarstwa Wiejskiego w Warszawie (SGGW)
- Università degli Studi di Parma (UNIPR)
The implementation of cost-effective and efficient coexistence measures requires a local approach taking in account the specificities of territories and local stakeholders. The ETUCOM project will provide a solution enabling “territorialisation” of good coexistence practices of previous research projects. Through a local-based Information Service for all potential users and a Communication Program targeting all concerned key-players, the ETUCOM will facilitate the implementation of existing coexistence tools and guidelines, which:
- are efficient and cost-effective,
- guarantee the freedom of choice of farmers,
- allow local authorities to develop their future socio-economic strategies,
- allow stakeholders to get transparent information,
- will be exploited by SMEs to enlarge their market.
Territorialisation will allow a territory to build local and regional consensus taking into account:
- prevalent types of agriculture,
- territorial dimension of the typical farming units,
- consistence of the principal food/feed supply chains,
- main issues for the civil society concerning coexistence,
- local rural development plans and consistency with the CAP.
Within ETUCOM, territorialisation is based on 2 concepts: The SETU (Sustainable Elementary Territorial Unit) is an area concerned by the coexistence problematic and the SETUP (Sustainable Elementary Territorial Units Platform) is a communication and consensus reaching platform for all relevant players. The practical application of the concepts will be validated in 3 case studies in Bulgaria, Spain and Turkey.
An added value to territory products is expected through a territorial labelling and a related product certification.
The project is proposed by 20 partners (from 11 Member States, Turkey and Brazil): 12 academic and research institutions, 6 SMEs, and 2 stakeholders covering in an optimal way the different EU farming systems. An Advisory Group of 20 members will provide useful advice, evaluations and recommendations.
The strategic objectives of the ETUCOM project focus on three mains axis of actions, which are presented in the figure below. The goal is to demonstrate that territorialisation is the best solution to achieve the scientific and technical objectives.
1. The definition of a general framework and a methodology for the development of the SETU and SETUP concepts based on EU funded research projects, which have a spatial and/or territorial relevance, which are cost-effective and can be validated by selected groups of professionals and other stakeholders (WP1, WP2, WP3).
2. The overall proof of concept the project which is organised around 3 case studies (WP4, WP5, WP6) in order to:
- Validate and adapt the SETU and SETUP concepts in each territory.
- Validate crop specific coexistence management tools adapted to territorial units, labelling and certification.
- Carry out the cost-benefits analysis used to assess the socioeconomic viability of the overall concept
- Develop an Integrated Information service, capable of providing direct support to all users for implementation of coexistence.
3. The implementation of an efficient communication platform and framework for the external communication between the SETUP and the various actors involved in coexistence management within a territory. This communication platform will give them the opportunity to exchange information on tools in a direct way. Specific measures will be applied so that national and cultural differences that may affect information consistency are overcome (WP7).
There are close interactions between the aforementioned action axis since most of the information collected through the case studies will contribute to the validation of the concepts and will provide important inputs to the information service and communication processes. As a consequence, a consistent tool of direct communication will be created, which will provide a continuous information flow to all interested actors and which will register and evaluate all comments and feedbacks. Through its monitoring program the SETUP will provide a tool to assess in real time and for the whole territory the efficiency of the biological containment strategy, not only for the cultivated crops but also for the flow of agricultural commodities (feed components in particular).
To achieve these objectives, the project has been divided into 8 Work Packages :
- WP1 will make an inventory of known territorial coexistence measures and of the concerned target groups to be integrated in SETUP. It will also select confinement strategies, segregation measures and other tools relevant to ETUCOM and their specifications regarding their implementation in the information system.
- WP2 will define a conceptual framework for the territorialisation of coexistence taking into account the specificities a territory in terms of maintaining viable forms of farming systems, and optimizing its potential sustainable development.
- WP3 will define a comprehensive and effective organizational platform (SETUP) in order to reach consensus among different stakeholders.
- WP4 will define the methodology to be used for the proof of concept.
- WP5 will implement three case studies to demonstrate the ETUCOM added value.
- WP6 will be dedicated to the development of the Integrated Information service.
- WP7 will concern public communication, dissemination issues and exploitation of the project results by SMEs.
- WP8 will deal with all aspects of efficient project management and coordination.
36 months duration
Total budget: 4 130 152 euros
European funding: 2 979 877 euros