HORIZON EUROPE
European
Specific Challenge:Improving the sustainability of European farming systems and facilitating their transition is a key objective of the Common Agricultural Policy and of Horizon 2020. Research and innovation activities should play a key role in efforts to move towards more sustainable and resilient production systems, but often this is undermined by the lack of efficient approaches to convince the farming community and demonstrate the validity of innovative knowledge. Best practices often remain tacit knowledge within local communities and are not spread across the EU territory or made known to researchers. Also, it is recognised that a farmer’s main source of information is other farmers, and their experience and opinions are often decisive.
Demonstration and pilot farms have a major role to play in the application of scientific findings and the spreading of best practices and innovative farming approaches within the farming community. Efforts are needed to develop their potential and prepare for European connectivity. Condition for effective peer-to-peer learning is that the demonstration farm operates under the same conditions as average commercial farms, i.e. subje...
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Specific Challenge:Improving the sustainability of European farming systems and facilitating their transition is a key objective of the Common Agricultural Policy and of Horizon 2020. Research and innovation activities should play a key role in efforts to move towards more sustainable and resilient production systems, but often this is undermined by the lack of efficient approaches to convince the farming community and demonstrate the validity of innovative knowledge. Best practices often remain tacit knowledge within local communities and are not spread across the EU territory or made known to researchers. Also, it is recognised that a farmer’s main source of information is other farmers, and their experience and opinions are often decisive.
Demonstration and pilot farms have a major role to play in the application of scientific findings and the spreading of best practices and innovative farming approaches within the farming community. Efforts are needed to develop their potential and prepare for European connectivity. Condition for effective peer-to-peer learning is that the demonstration farm operates under the same conditions as average commercial farms, i.e. subject to normal regulatory constraints and using the alternative production systems or agricultural practices/technologies in the course of its normal commercial farming activity.
Scope:Proposals should involve producing a geo-referenced inventory of existing demonstration farms, providing an analysis of the key elements of efficient demonstration techniques and exploring the potential of farmer-to-farmer learning. In a first step, activities should map open commercial farms that engage in demonstration activities in Europe and describe the mediation techniques they apply. This inventory should be organised around a list of sectoral themes (focusing on specific primary products, e.g. crops, livestock, etc.) and also non-sectorial/cross-cutting themes (e.g. specific farming systems, energy saving, supply chain initiatives, care farming, etc.).
From this inventory of open farms, proposals shall take a broad range of cases with a geographical coverage representative of EU agricultural sectors, systems and territories. They will analyse the various types of demonstration farms and programmes that use a commercial farm setting, looking at what they do, how they do it, who plays what role, and what is the impact. Project activities should result in a better insight in approaches and policies to encourage effective demonstration activities, and add value in this respect to the European Innovation Partnership "Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability", its networking activities (e.g. EIP Focus Groups) and its Operational Groups.
To deepen understanding of effective demonstration activities, consortia will include a sufficient number of actors with practical experience of such activities, including, as a minimum, agricultural/forestry practitioners (demonstration farms) and intermediary persons/bodies organising or facilitating on-farm demonstrations. Proposals should fall under the concept of the 'multi-actor approach'[1] and may involve a wide range of actors, such as farmers/farmers' groups, advisors, innovation support services, researchers, social scientists, EIP Operational Groups[2], national/regional networks and enterprises or other supply chain actors where relevant.
Proposals should provide input for and look for synergies with topic RUR-12-2017 to ensure that the inventory of demonstration farms and best demonstration practices resulting from this topic result in concrete thematic knowledge exchange activities across European sectors and systems under that topic. Projects should provide input to and liaise with the SCAR- AKIS Strategic Working Group.
The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU of up to EUR 2 million and a maximum period of 30 months would allow for this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude the submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.
Expected Impact:This activity should produce a better overview of effective practical approaches for demonstration activities on commercial farms. An inventory of demonstration farms and an analysis of their techniques, and the policies supporting these, would promote farmer-to-farmer learning. The following impacts can be expected:
an inventory of open farms engaging in demonstration activities in Europe, detailing the sectors, themes and topics on which they provide particular expertise, which feeds into the EIP-AGRI web-databases; a set of best practical approaches for demonstration projects and programmes that are effective in increasing application of innovative entrepreneurial practices and scientific knowledge; improved understanding of effective demonstration approaches, project types and programmes, and of the increased potential for knowledge exchange offered by farmer-to-farmer learning. This should cover both demonstration of research results and the spreading of best farming practices among practitioners, possibly accompanied by a limited set of appropriate indicators to measure the impact of such activities; recommendations for Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS) governance and policies on how to support effective demonstration activities; the adding of value to the European Innovation Partnership "Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability", its network and its Operational Groups; and a basis, organised around a list of themes, to support networking and learning among commercial demonstration farms in the EU territory under RUR-12-2017 contributing to a more competitive, sustainable and climate-smart agriculture and forestry.
Cross-cutting Priorities:Socio-economic science and humanities
[1]See definition of the 'multi-actor approach' in the introduction to this Work Programme part.
[2]For the EIP and RD Operational groups, see introduction to the Work Programme and http://ec.europa.eu/eip/agriculture/
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Consortium characteristics
:
The aid is European, you can apply to this line any company that is part of the European Community.
characteristics of the Proyecto
Los costes de personal subvencionables cubren las horas de trabajo efectivo de las personas directamente dedicadas a la ejecución de la acción. Los propietarios de pequeñas y medianas empresas que no perciban salario y otras personas físicas que no perciban salario podrán imputar los costes de personal sobre la base de una escala de costes unitarios
Los otros costes directos se dividen en los siguientes apartados: Viajes, amortizaciones, equipamiento y otros bienes y servicios. Se financia la amortización de equipos, permitiendo incluir la amortización de equipos adquiridos antes del proyecto si se registra durante su ejecución. En el apartado de otros bienes y servicios se incluyen los diferentes bienes y servicios comprados por los beneficiarios a proveedores externos para poder llevar a cabo sus tareas
La subcontratación en ayudas europeas no debe tratarse del core de actividades de I+D del proyecto. El contratista debe ser seleccionado por el beneficiario de acuerdo con el principio de mejor relación calidad-precio bajo las condiciones de transparencia e igualdad (en ningún caso consistirá en solicitar menos de 3 ofertas). En el caso de entidades públicas, para la subcontratación se deberán de seguir las leyes que rijan en el país al que pertenezca el contratante
Characteristics of financing
List of countries and applicable rules for funding: described in part A of the General Annexes of the General Work Programme.
Note also that a number of non-EU/non-Associated Countries that are not automatically eligible for funding have made specific provisions for making funding available for their participants in Horizon 2020 projects (follow the links to China, Japan, Republic of Korea, Mexico, Russia, Taiwan).
Eligibility and admissibility conditions: described in part B and C of the General Annexes of the General Work Programme
Proposal page limits and layout: Please refer to Part B of the standard proposal template.
Evaluation
3.1 Evaluation criteria and procedure, scoring and threshold: described in part H of the General Annexes of the General Work Programme
3.2 Submission and evaluation process: Guide to the submission and evaluation process
Indicative timetable for evaluation and grant agreement:
Information on the outcome of single-stage evaluation: maximum 5 months from the deadline for submission.
Signature of grant agreements: maximum 8 months from the deadline for submission.
Information on the outcome of two-stage evaluation:
For stage 1: maximum 3 m... Please read carefully all provisions below before the preparation of your application.
List of countries and applicable rules for funding: described in part A of the General Annexes of the General Work Programme.
Note also that a number of non-EU/non-Associated Countries that are not automatically eligible for funding have made specific provisions for making funding available for their participants in Horizon 2020 projects (follow the links to China, Japan, Republic of Korea, Mexico, Russia, Taiwan).
Eligibility and admissibility conditions: described in part B and C of the General Annexes of the General Work Programme
Proposal page limits and layout: Please refer to Part B of the standard proposal template.
Evaluation
3.1 Evaluation criteria and procedure, scoring and threshold: described in part H of the General Annexes of the General Work Programme
3.2 Submission and evaluation process: Guide to the submission and evaluation process
Indicative timetable for evaluation and grant agreement:
Information on the outcome of single-stage evaluation: maximum 5 months from the deadline for submission.
Signature of grant agreements: maximum 8 months from the deadline for submission.
Information on the outcome of two-stage evaluation:
For stage 1: maximum 3 months from the deadline for submission.
For stage 2: maximum 5 months from the deadline for submission.
Signature of grant agreements: maximum 8 months from the deadline for submission.
Provisions, proposal templates and evaluation forms for the type(s) of action(s) under this topic:
Coordination and supporting actions
Specific provisions and funding rates
Standard proposal template
Standard evaluation form
H2020 General MGA -Multi-Beneficiary
Annotated Grant Agreement
6. Additional provisions:
Horizon 2020 budget flexibility
Technology readiness levels (TRL) – where a topic description refers to TRL, these definitions apply.
Financial support to Third Parties – where a topic description foresees financial support to Third Parties, these provisions apply.
7. Open access must be granted to all scientific publications resulting from Horizon 2020 actions, and proposals must refer to measures envisaged. Where relevant, proposals should also provide information on how the participants will manage the research data generated and/or collected during the project, such as details on what types of data the project will generate, whether and how this data will be exploited or made accessible for verification and re-use, and how it will be curated and preserved. This topic participates per default in the open access to research data pilot which aims to improve and maximise access to and re-use of research data generated by projects:
The pilot applies to the data needed to validate the results presented in scientific publications. Additionally, projects can choose to make other data available for open access and need to describe their approach in a Data Management Plan (to be provided within six months after the project start).
Note that the evaluation phase proposals will not be evaluated more favourably because they are part of the Pilot, and will not be penalised for opting out of the Pilot.
Projects can at any stage opt-out of the pilot.
The legal requirements for projects participating in this pilot are in the article 29.3 of the Model Grant Agreement
Further information on the Open Research Data Pilot is made available in the H2020 Online Manual.
8. Additional documents
H2020 Work Programme 2016-17: Introduction
H2020 Work Programme 2016-17: Food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine and maritime and inland water research and the bioeconomy
H2020 Work Programme 2016-17: Dissemination, Exploitation and Evaluation
H2020 Work Programme 2016-17: General Annexes
Legal basis: Horizon 2020 - Regulation of Establishment
Legal basis: Horizon 2020 Rules for Participation
Legal basis: Horizon 2020 Specific Programme
Additional information about the call
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