Big data is becoming a hype that is going to completely redefine industries within very traditional sectors like agriculture, food and beauty. The emergence of niche big data companies like Enolytics (“bringing big data insights to the wine industry”) is threatening to disrupt these industries against the interests of the EU. BigDataGrapes wants to build upon the rich historical, cultural and artisan heritage of Europe in order to change this picture. It aims to support all European companies active in two key industries powered by grapevines: the wine industry and the natural cosmetics one. It will help them respond to the significant opportunity that big data is creating in their relevant markets, by pursuing two ambitious goals: a. To develop and demonstrate powerful, rigorously tested, cross-sector data processing technologies that go beyond-the-state-of-the-art towards increasing the efficiency of companies that need to take important business decisions dependent on access to vast and complex amounts of data, and assess them in challenges informed by the grapevine-powered industries. b. To create a large-scale, mulifaceted marketplace for grapevine-related data assets, increasing the competitive advantage of companies that serve with IT solutions these sectors and helping companies and organisations evolve methods, standards and processes to help them achieve free, interoperable and secure flow of their data. BigDataGrapes is targeting technology challenges of the grapevine-powered data economy as its business problems and decisions requires processing, analysis and visualisation of data with rapidly increasing volume, velocity and variety: satellite and weather data, environmental and geological data, phenotypic and genetic plant data, food supply chain data, economic and financial data and more. It therefore makes a perfectly suitable cross-sector and cross-country combination of industries that are of high European significance and value.

Oper8 will set-up a self-sustainable, multi-actor, EU-wide Thematic Network to support and promote solutions for non-chemical weed control by building upon the knowledge and outcomes of 8 Operational Groups 7 countries, and stimulate knowledge exchange among all relevant actors and stakeholders. With the ambition to achieve a high impact and improve the sustainability of the European agricultural sector, the synthesis of partner OGs is based on their expertise, geographical location, novelty of solutions, as well as the established connections with the AKIS actors. Special emphasis has been placed on collaboration schemes among these OGs that progress at a different pace providing the opportunity to learn from the ‘early birds’, which will bring hands-on experience. The project will follow a multi-actor approach, implement a bottom up and top down model and build upon co-creation & cross fertilisation activities to help farmers access up-to-date knowledge, tools and techniques, applicable to specific conditions and needs.To this end, Oper8 will: (i) establish a stakeholder engagement processes to assemble the 7 National Networks (NNs); (ii) capture the drivers, barriers, and root causes of lack of non-chemical weed control adoption as part of a bottom-up approach; (iii) establish cross-fertilisation activities within and between the NNs to co-create, showcase, and evaluate non-chemical weed control methods; and (iv) deploy knowledge transfer tools and techniques (workshops, demo farms, CAP Measures) to adapt and scale up alternative weed control solutions and ensure their diffusion across EU. A series of actions (e.g., demonstration activities, policy recommendations and training sessions) for integrating project results into the CAP National strategic plans will be implemented, strengthening the AKIS and, ultimately, paving the way towards a transition to a sustainable agriculture in adherence to the Green Deal and its Farm to Fork strategy.

PRUDENT aspires to change the way agriculture and forestry systems currently operate and to accelerate the transition to sustainable agriculture and forestry practices and smart farming technologies. The project will identify and evaluate the most effective green nudges, in the context of appropriate behavioural and experimental settings, that can enable farmer/forester behavioural change to more sustainable agriculture and forestry. Nudges will be also tested in natural contexts to evaluate the interactive effect of nudges with actual policy changes in the transition to sustainability. Innovative nudging tools, in the form of web/mobile apps, will be employed to boost farmer/forester self-regulatory capacity and enhance the durability of nudging effects. Four different systems, representing major farming and forestry systems in Europe (arable crops [wheat], perennial crops [grapevines, apples, olives], livestock [bovines] and forests [boreal forests]) in various EU regions (Northern, Southern, and Central Europe) will be studied to account for the heterogeneity of farming/forestry systems and contexts in the EU. The behavioural insights are used to develop transformative pathways, via social innovations, business models and policy recommendations, to encourage transition to fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly agriculture and forestry systems. PRUDENT will provide a set of social innovations and business models establishing roadmaps for a shift towards sustainable agriculture and forestry and will develop a series of policy recommendations and tools to foster behaviourally informed policy design and implementation. Throughout the project's lifespan, multiple value chain actors, at various levels of society, will actively participate in co-creation activities to establish a mutual understanding of the benefits and bottlenecks of the value chain, as well as effective transformation pathways to change.

<< Objectives >>This project aims to involve VET trainees and trainers in STEM training using innovative Digital Agriculture technologies. Learners will participate in interdisciplinary activities from the real job market that encourage young people to be creative with technology and acquire digital skills in demand. Modern Digital Agriculture is chosen as a practice that incorporates STEM disciplines that can enhance the attractiveness of the VET Institute and can lead to the job market.<< Implementation >>1)Managing the STEM4Agri Project 2)Adapting the necessary conventional and mainly cutting-edge agricultural technologies paradigm from the AUA university curriculum to the VET curriculum 3)Training VET trainers 4)Training VET trainees in the context of focusing on STEM actions and artifacts that are directly related to environmental and agricultural processes 5)Verifying the skills acquired by all the trainees 6)Dissemination of beneficial results.<< Results >>Participating trainees will be benefited from various STEM themes combining creativity, innovation, and constructiveness that can lead to a promising career. As they work on their interdisciplinary projects, they will have the opportunity to develop digital skills, explore scientific concepts, be familiar with the digitization of food & beverages sector and apply Digital and Sustainable agricultural practices. The project also provides trainers with professional development skills on STEM field.