Strengthening knowledge and skills of advisors and integrating them within Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems (AKIS) via an EU advisory network

Expected Outcome:

Successful proposal will support the common agricultural policy (CAP), in particular its cross-cutting objective^[1], and related climate, biodiversity and other environmental policies, by connecting impartial advisors across all EU Member States in an EU-wide network.

Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:

• the organisation and integration of impartial advisors (both public and private) within the national/regional and European AKIS^[2] is strengthened, and the exchanges between them and other relevant AKIS actors are intensified^[3];
• the impartial advisors are better equipped with the practice-oriented and up-to-date knowledge, skills and tools enabling them to support farmers with high quality and impartial advice covering the three dimensions of sustainability – economic, environmental and social – in line with all objectives of the CAP^[4];
• the sharing and use in practice of existing and new knowledge and solutions by farmers is accelerated and widespread thanks to more competent, skilled and impartial advisors, supporting the transition towards more competitive, sustainable and resilient farming.

Scope:

Advisors are best placed to encourage farmers to change their practices that improve the competitiveness, sustainability and resilience of farming. A novelty in the current CAP strategic plans^[5] is that advisors should be integrated within the AKIS as well as be impartial, competent and up to date on scientific and innovation developments. They should be able to translate the knowledge and provide concrete, targeted and practical solutions for farmers adapted to specific local circumstances. They should be prepared to provide innovation support services, based on the interactive innovation model. They should also be able to use diverse data sources to analyse the performance of farms over time covering the three dimensions of sustainability and accordingly provide informed, holistic advice to the farmers.

Against this background, proposals should:

• improve the organisation and concrete services provided by impartial advisors, both public and private, within Member States’ AKIS in a collaborative way, including by (1) ensuring more networked structures, deepening the advisors’ integration into AKIS at EU and national/regional levels, and (2) developing and advancing more effective and interactive working methodologies and tools;
• improve advisors’ knowledge and skills across the EU in all areas of high interest to practitioners, covering competitiveness and the three dimensions of sustainability in line with all the objectives of CAP, at minimum by (1) enhancing the provision and management of knowledge useful for practice, and the sound thematic organisation and interaction of advisors and other relevant actors within AKIS in knowledge hubs, ensuring stronger links between research, education, advisors and farmers and encouraging the collection, wider sharing and use of available knowledge across the EU; (2) organising a substantial amount of activities to improve collaboration between advisors at the EU/national/regional levels, and enable them to effectively and widely share their knowledge, experience and skills, (3) creating and sharing tools, training courses and informative materials useful for advisors and their clients, as well as developing and applying approach(es) to motivate advisors to participate in and make use of them;
• improve and support the understanding and implementation of the interactive innovation model by the advisory community acting as innovation support services^[6], including by (1) illustrating it with practical examples, (2) providing methodology and training for continued professional development, and (3) ensuring regular communication of research and innovation needs collected from practice to the relevant AKIS actors;
• create, regularly update and manage an online platform serving as a reference point for advisors and their clients that includes at minimum: (1) a database of advisors’ contacts and profiles (at least including education, professional experience and specific field(s) of expertise), (2) diverse robust data sources and decision support tools (including tutorials), (3) training courses and informative materials, (4) best practice examples (taking account of the costs and benefits for end-users), and (5) other tools and materials relevant for the target audience. The online platform should integrate the practice-oriented outputs from Horizon and CAP-funded projects useful for advisory services, and its entire content (not only interface) should be translated into all 24 official EU languages.

Proposals should include a dedicated task and appropriate resources to collaborate with, ensure complementarities, avoid duplication of efforts and use efficiently the outputs and activities of the relevant past, existing and future AKIS projects^[7].

Proposals must implement the 'multi-actor approach'. Minimum 50% of the number of the participants involved in the project should be impartial advisors spending at least half of their time on giving advice to farmers. The partners within the consortium should be well networked with advisors overall and have the capacity to involve as many of the advisors professionally active in providing advice to farmers as possible across the EU into the activities of the project.

Proposals should cover a wide range of impartial advisors working on diverse themes of interest for practitioners from all EU Member States and improve collaboration between them, using the countries’ AKIS structures (including the AKIS Coordination Bodies) as intermediaries. To this end, proposals may involve financial support to third parties to ensure the involvement of advisors from across the whole EU in the activities of the advisory network. Consortia need to define the selection process of the advisors / advisory services and/or other relevant AKIS actors.

The project should run for a minimum of seven years. An initial plan for financial sustainability and maintenance of the EU advisory network in the long-term beyond the project duration should be included in the proposal.

[1] Article 6(2) of the Regulation (EU) 2021/2115

[2] AKIS is defined in Article 3(9) of the Regulation (EU) 2021/2115

[3] To this end strong interaction with AKIS Coordination Bodies organising advice and knowledge flows within their Member States will be necessary and illustrated in the proposal.

[4] In line with the Article 15(3) of the Regulation (EU) 2021/2115, Member States shall ensure that the advice given is impartial and that advisors are suitably qualified, appropriately trained and have no conflict of interest. The proposals should aim to support Member States in fulfilling this obligation.

[5] Article 15 of the Regulation (EU) 2021/2115, Article 15(4)(e) of the Regulation (EU) 2021/2115, Article 127(3) of the Regulation (EU) 2021/2115

[6] e.g., for the creation and implementation of the EIP-AGRI Operational Groups (Article 15(4) of the Regulation (EU) 2021/2115

[7] In particular but not exhaustive the projects funded under Horizon 2020, Horizon Europe and CAP:

advisory and thematic networks, ATTRACTISS, modernAKIS, i2connect, PREMIERE, EU-FarmBook, the future project to be selected under the topic HORIZON-CL6-2025-03-GOVERNANCE-14, and relevant EIP-AGRI Operational Groups projects (notably on knowledge hubs)