On June 28, 2017, PRIMA Consortium participated to the COST event “Water for Agriculture and Food in the Mediterranean Area”.
As a precursor of advanced multidisciplinary research, COST has been contributing – since its creation in 1971 – to closing the gap between science, policy makers and society throughout Europe and beyond. While supporting trans-national cooperation among researchers, engineers and scholars in the field of agriculture and water for food, the European stakeholders discuss the most recent related issues, with a strong focus on the Mediterranean area. Specifically, COST aims to provide networking opportunities to structure this important topic, to link the active researchers with policy stakeholders and thus connect the dots in the European Research Area.
The workshop was an open space for the identification of relevant R&I and policy topics for the Mediterranean area in relation to:
• Smart and sustainable farming
• Improved land- and water- sustainability and management; new governance models
• Reduced pests and pathogens in farming
• Innovative solutions in agri-business
The event aimed to increase awareness on the different relevant funding opportunities in the field and how to access them (promoting research cooperation funding programmes related to water and agriculture issues: Information on PRIMA and Calls from JPIs, ERA-NETs; H2020, EIT, EUREKA Agri). Participants decided on the issues to discuss, such as emerging S&T topics in the field, identifying potential future research cooperation. Links between stakeholders and COST Actions also allowed input to the Strategic Research Agendas worked on. Furthermore, there was an interesting international cooperation component for COST Actions: more actively engaging participants from Near Neighbour Countries in the Mediterranean area.
COST Action participants, members of the COST Scientific Committeeand other COST bodies were invited to the event as well as stakeholders such as European Commission officials, representatives involved in PRIMA, Water JPI and FACCE, ERANETMED, ARIMNet-2, SUSAN ERA-NET, EUREKA Agri, EIT KICs, EIPs, SCAR, Rector Conferences, ETPs and other advisory and policy bodies.
The event was by invitation only.
Further information about this COST Connect event can be requested via Cost.Connect1@cost.eu from Mafalda Quintas and Ioanna Stavridou, COST Science Officers, and Elke Dall, COST Policy Officer.
More information available at the following link: http://www.cost.eu/events/cost-connect-water