ExpectedOutcome:
Projects results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:
- Relevant economic sectors affected by climate change are transformed and ready to face the future anticipated climate changes risks;
- An increased and improved range of climate-resilient business models, value chains, and re-skilling opportunities (including training capabilities) are understood, socially acceptable and made available to all regions and communities;
- An increased capacity of local businesses, social partnerns and industries for sustainable coping with climate change;
- An increased capacity of national, regional and/or local governments, consumers organizations and other social partners, industries and businesses in empowering consumers to make informed choices and play active roles in transition to climate resilience;
- A better understanding of mechanisms that would drive transformation of the economic systems thanks to innovation, intended not only as technical innovation but also including social and user-driven innovation.
Scope:
This topic contributes to the three objective of the Mission and correspond to one of the thematic research areas described in the Mission Implementation Plan[1]. It is to support regions and communities participating in the Mission in all steps of their transformational journey to climate resilience with finding, innovating, and testing solutions that help their economic systems to become sustainable and climate resilient. The applied research and the experimentation with innovative solutions as further outlined below should be at the centre of the project.
Climate change affects macroeconomic outcomes, financial markets and institutions primarily through physical risks (gradual warming and extreme events) and transition risks. Possible channels of impact of climate change on the European economy include, for example, decline in agricultural productivity and yields, lower labour productivity due to extreme heatwaves and lower human capital accumulation due to increased health issues and mortality, new or increased occupational health and safety risks to workers, disruption to transport and production chains, or changes in sectoral composition of labour markets leading to higher structural unemployment.[2]
The transformation of economic systems towards climate resilience will have to find pathways to climate resilience and sustainability for all relevant sectors that are affected by climate change, including climate-resilient business models, value chains, up-skilling and re-skilling dynamics, and always considering at the heart of the debate the acceptance of the innovations to be implemented by the society. These pathways should be aligned with the regions’ smart specialisation strategies and integrated in the overall climate adaptation strategy of regions.
The support that the projects are to provide the regions and communities should include the following main aspects (further detailed below):
- To provide direct support to the regions and communities sharing relevant state-of-the-art knowledge, best practices and emerging innovations and solutions relevant to the transformation of all regional economic systems that are affected by climate change in the regional economic systems to become climate resilient.
- To undertake research and test innovative solutions, not only technically but also socially feasible, using the activities ongoing in the regions and communities as case studies to better understand their success factors and to explore and experiment with new innovative ways of preparing regional economic systems and their industries to become climate resilient and sustainable, building strengths on consumer protection and to feed this information back to all regions and communities.
- While undertaking the above, ensure synergies between the Mission and other relevant programmes and initiatives supporting transformations of economic systems to sustainability and resilience at local, national, and European level and to share relevant knowledge and experience made in the Mission more broadly.
Regarding the provision of direct support to the regions and communities, the proposal should cover a broad range of approaches, mechanisms and initiatives to prepare the economic systems across the production and consumption to become climate resilience, including but not limited to:
- support at least 20 regions or communities in the development of pathways for the transformation of all relevant sectors of their economic system that are affected by climate change;
- support to building public-private cooperation in the relevant industry helping them to transition to become at the same time resilient to climate change and compliant with the Sustainable Finance Taxonomy;
- improve skills intelligence to ensure up-to-date information on the skills needed to support the transformation to climate resilience, e.g. by developing a skills forecasting system, and fostering skills strategies aligning efforts across employment, consumption, education, research, industry and regional development policies;
- inform about alternative ways to more resilient regional and local economies, such as the approach of community wealth building[3] that emphasise more democratic ownership of the economy at local level, e.g., by developing local industrial strategies which stimulate co-operatives and social businesses or the creation of regional investment vehicles and holding companies;
Regarding the undertaking of research and test innovative solutions, the proposal should consider as test beds the opportunities offered by regions and communities already engaged in the Mission’s endeavour and expand from there to address activities related to the transformation of economic systems across the Mission’s geographical scope as case-studies to:
- understand how best to employ the various approaches and mechanisms in different cultural, social, political, economic and environmental contexts;
- test and experiment with innovative approaches encouraging place-based industrial innovation and experimentation allowing at least 20 regions or communities to develop and test new solutions (including with SMEs and consumers where relevant), drawing on their local characteristics, strengths and specialisms[4];
- establish a continuous monitoring and data gathering on what goes well and what goes wrong, which local initiatives are not successful and how to re-orient them;
- improve measurement, modelling and policy tools to capture synergies between the circular economy and climate change adaptation;
- design and test short courses to reskill workers and master courses to train experts towards emerging jobs and new skills requirements related to the transition to climate resilience;
Regarding the synergies between the Mission and other relevant initiatives supporting transformations of economic systems to sustainability and resilience at local, national, and European level the proposal should describe:
- how it would bring to bear the different elements of the various other relevant programmes and initiatives within the context of the Mission, e.g., cohesion policy, regional smart specialisation strategies and ERDF funds, the New Industrial Strategy, the New Skills Agenda and ESF+ funds, the Circular Economy Action Plan, the Farm to Fork Strategy and the EU taxonomy for sustainable activities;
- how it would feed back the experience and lessons learnt within the Mission back to the other relevant programmes and initiatives.
Proposals should include a process and criteria to identify the regions and communities most relevant to become test beds for the proposed solutions, starting from those where Mission relevant activities are already ongoing. Priority should be given to regions or communities with high vulnerability[5], limited resources and/or low adaptive capacity[6] to climate change impacts. Proposals should present the process and criteria to target regions and communities selected. These criteria will ensure that a variety of locations are represented, in as many countries as possible, reflecting the diversity in climatic risks in Europe, as well as differences in socio-economic and demographic conditions, and in approaches to mitigating such risks. Such criteria should also take into account the characteristics of the populations concerned and the vulnerability of the locations, as well as the priority attributed by the national and regional governments. Consultation of national and/or regional governments in selecting the regions and communities is recommended (for example, by providing a letter of support by the relevant authorities as an annex to the proposal).
In line with the overall principles of the Mission, proposals should take in full consideration the local dimension of climate change and climate adaptation strategies, clarify how they would ensure a meaningful engagement with local communities as well as stakeholders to ensure, among others, the mobilization of local knowledge, and outline how they would contribute to achieving a just transition to climate resilience.
The consortium proposed to deliver on this action should include relevant industrial knowledge, with a capacity to understand and drive systemic, broadly defined innovation, including from the relevant innovation ecosystems and private sector; it should also count on expertise in social innovation, in user-driven innovation, in Living Labs dynamics, in transformative innovation.
The European Commission intends to establish a network and coordination activities amongst all the projects funded for the implementation of the Climate adaptation Mission, under the Horizon 2020 European Green Deal call and under Horizon Europe relevant for adaptation, and that will be coordinated by the soon to be established Mission Implementation Platform. These networking and joint activities could, for example, involve the participation in joint workshops, the exchange of knowledge, the development and adoption of best practices, or joint communication activities. The project under this topic will be requested to contribute to this effort. Applicants should acknowledge this request and already account for these obligations in their proposal, making adequate provisions in terms of resources and budget to engage and collaborate with the Mission governance.
Cross-cutting Priorities:
Social sciences and humanitiesSocietal Engagement
[1]https://ec.europa.eu/info/publications/implementation-plans-eu-missions_en
[2]European Central Bank (ECB) Occasional Paper Series No 217 / September 2021
[3]Owning the future: After Covid-19, a new era of community wealth building
[4]A New Industrial Strategy for Europe, COM(2020) 102 final
[5]Vulnerability is the propensity or predisposition to be adversely affected. Vulnerability encompasses a variety of concepts and elements including sensitivity or susceptibility to harm and lack of capacity to cope and adapt (IPCC, 2018 – SR Global Warming of 1.5 ºC)
[6]Adaptive capacity is the ability of systems, institutions, humans and other organisms to adjust to potential damage, to take advantage of opportunities, or to respond to consequences (IPCC, 2018 – SR Global Warming of 1.5 ºC)
