The PPILOW project aims to co-construct through a multi-actor approach solutions to improve the welfare of poultry and pigs reared in organic and low-input outdoor farming systems. The first originality of PPILOW is the participatory approach, involving all actors of the production chain from farmers to consumers, citizens, scientists and policy makers, for proposing and studying welfare improvement levers. The second originality of the project is to provide a combination of practical solutions for welfare improvement that can be applied on a pan-European basis with specific adjustments depending on citizen’s expectations and the target market (national legislation or consumer preferences). More precisely, PPILOW will co-create with end-users welfare self-assessment tools, innovative breeding and rearing strategies and techniques for improving the welfare of animals by avoiding mutilations (piglet castration or beak trimming in poultry), the elimination of one day-old layer male chicks, favouring positive behaviours, and improving health and robustness in both species. The innovative solutions will be investigated experimentally and the most promising ones will be tested on-farm. Multi-criteria analyses of the most effective breeding and rearing strategies will then be realised to evaluate their economic, social and environmental impacts based on the ‘One Welfare’ concept embracing sustainability goals with specific emphasis on animal and human welfare. Business models will be created for the use of high-quality products issued from the adoption of PPILOW strategies to improve welfare in organic and low-input outdoor farming systems for poultry and pigs. Finally, to ensure the rapid uptake of the project results by end-users, appropriate dissemination activities will be developed (such as training, digital videos from field partners, EIP abstracts…) and the close involvement of national practitioner groups throughout the EU will be managed to facilitate change.

In order to reduce GHG-emissions by at least 50% by 2050 compared with 1990 levels and incresease carbon sequestration and storage a strong systemic approach is required. Different single solutions exist for different production systems, but if one wants to break the glass ceiling new organisational, technical and financial solutions are requested. These solution have to be supported by voluntarist policies. ClieNFarms is based on 20 demonstration case-studies (I3S) where systemic innovative solutions will be tested and evaluated using up-to-date modeling approaches and multicriteria assessment tools. These case-studies will pave the diversity of the production systems (crops, cattle, dairy, special crop productions, etc) and the diversity of geographical situations (from East to West and North to South of Europe, plus one in New-Zealand). The solutions will be co-designed with farmers and the surrounding ecosystem (R&D, finance, supply chain, etc) through creative arena in a living-lab like structure. Involving finance and supply chain will help creating an enabling environment for farmers transition to climate-neutral farms. I3S structure aims to allow for 1 demonstration farm to reach 10 lead commercial farms and then 100 outreach farms. With the help of the supply a much larger number of farmers will be reached. All the solutions will be recorded in the ClieNFarms data hub that will be an open catalog for every one interested in climate mitigation in the agricultural sector. Different guidelines and tools will be part of the outputs of the projects. A large dissemination of the results project will be made through professional newspapers, scientific articles, social networks, etc. ClieNFarms will also develop bricks for capacity building allowing to show in a short sequence pros and cons of the different solutions and tools. ClieNFarms will create a dialog with other on-going project and with the EC. ClieNFarms gather 33 partners and will last 4 years.

The overall goal of DiverIMPACTS is to achieve the full potential of diversification of cropping systems for improved productivity, delivery of ecosystem services and resource-efficient and sustainable value chains by (i) assessing performances of crop diversification through rotation, intercropping and multiple cropping, (ii) providing rural areas actors with those key enablers and innovations that would remove existing barriers and ensure actual uptake of benefits of crop diversification at farm, value chain and territory levels and (iii) make recommendations to policy-makers to facilitate the coordination of all relevant actors within the value chain. DiverIMPACTS will build on existing experiences of crop diversification by networking and expanding 10 existing field experiments to quantify impacts of crop diversification and by accompanying 25 multi-actor case studies in their dynamic transition. DiverIMPACTS will propose a range of technical and organisational innovations to remove lock-ins from farmers to consumers as well as strategies and recommendations to sustain crop diversification. The consortium gathers a wide range of actors (farmers and farmer organisations, advisory services, cooperatives, logistic providers, scientists, industry, representatives of civil society and of rural areas). Through a multi-actor approach, DiverIMPACTS will accompany and support innovation groups in their dynamic process to develop sustainable value chain systems characterised by a high level of crop diversification and new market products. The consortium involves pioneer actors of crop diversification and has strong experience in both the design and multi-criteria assessment of innovative systems and the analysis of barriers that impede the transition towards sustainable diversified systems that contribute to the Rural Renaissance objectives.

The overall aim of the thematic network ‘OK-Net Arable’ is to improve the exchange of innovative and traditional knowledge among farmers, farm advisers and scientists to increase productivity and quality in organic arable cropping all over Europe, in order to satisfy future market demand. To achieve this, 'OK-Net Arable' has three specific objectives: 1) to create a European network of well-functioning farmer innovation groups representing the best examples of co-innovation by farmers and researchers. The network of farmer innovation groups will serve to exchange experiences in the area of arable crop production and test the innovative end-user and education material developed in the project; 2) to digest and synthesize the considerable knowledge available from the reservoir of scientific and practical knowledge in the area of organic arable farming and to identify the best methodology in learning and knowledge exchange. Based on this easily understandable education and end-user material will be developed; 3) to create a platform for knowledge exchange across Europe unique in organic farming, offering both innovative education and end-user material as well as offering opportunities for farmer-to-farmer, advisor-to-advisor or researcher-to-advisor-to-farmer learning. The multi-actor approach is prominent in this proposal: (1) at EU level with scientific partners and farmers' associations jointly coordinating the work packages; (2) on the local level with farmers, farm advisors and scientists cooperating in farmer innovation groups. The whole consortium covers in total 13 countries from all corners of Europe giving a well-balanced representation of different climate, geographical and socio-economic conditions.