EU CAP Network Workshop ‘Enhancing food security under changing weather patterns: farm adaptation’

• Identify challenges and explore potential solutions in dealing with changing weather patterns related to climate change.
• Exchange knowledge on successful practices, opportunities, and tools relevant for adapting farming to changing weather patterns, while increasing farm resilience and enhancing cooperation at both farm and local level.
• Identify needs from practice and possible knowledge gaps that may be informed by research.
• Promote networking among EIP-AGRI Operational Groups and other type of innovative projects, Horizon Europe multi-actor research projects and relevant stakeholders.

In order to set the basis for discussions, during the first morning short presentations on ‘setting the scene’ were presented. Emphasis was given to climate change scenarios, based on a global perspective. While focusing on Europe, the impacts on European agriculture, adaptation solutions, response from EU policies and the role of the EU CAP Network and EIP-AGRI in exchanging knowledge and practical experiences were presented. Most of the morning involved two breakout sessions where participants had time to reflect on climate change impacts, farm losses in their regions and knowledge gap requirements. In groups, participants shared challenges and solutions, which are presented in a summarised form in this report.

During the afternoon of the first day, the participants joined two field visits to observe farmers and Operational Groups (OGs) working to innovate and adapt their farms to enhance farm climate resilience.

During the second and final day of this workshop, participants were informed about two EU missions relevant to the topic. This included Research and Innovation (R&I) funding opportunities available through the Horizon Europe programme. Cooperation at the farm level was the topic up for discussion at and during the plenary session, with all the participants present. Other discussion topics during the plenary included: What cooperation is needed in order to adapt farming at landscape level? Are there examples or solutions of cooperation at landscape level currently being applied by the participants and projects involved in this workshop? And what alternative solutions of cooperation at landscape level could or should be implemented? The outcomes from this discussion were subsequently used to inform and motivate the participants in the next session.

Finally, the participants were allocated time to explore further collaboration possibilities, integrating their recent discussions on research needs, farm adaptation solutions and replication of such solutions, dissemination of results, piloting and cooperation. Using the Open Space Technology, participants were invited to propose an adaptation topic they wanted to put forward for further discussion amongst their peers. This was targeted at ideas they may have for a particular project, or a networking opportunity looking for synergies around preferred discussion topics. Following these discussions and interactions, eight parallel meetings took place. This resulted in more detailed dialogue and more concrete actions and next steps for future collaboration. The future of farming in Europe requires planned adaptation and that requires the creation and sharing of knowledge, innovation and networking.