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FP7-KBBE, Compatibility of Agricultural Management Practices and Types of Farming in the EU to enhance Climate Change Mitigation and Soil Health (CATCH-C)

The Catch-C project assesses the farm-compatibility of Best Management Practices (BMPs) that aim to promote productivity, climate change mitigation, and soil quality. These are the three overall goals of sustainable soil management. Catch-C will first (WP2) set up a typology of the main farm types and agro-ecological zones across Europe. This frame, coupled to a pan-European database of socio-economic and biophysical data, will be used for spatially organising the information collected on current management; and for up-scaling the impacts expected from changes in management. Biophysical impacts of management practices will be assessed (WP3) primarily from a large set of current field experiments, executed by the participants. BMPs will be formulated, along with their trade-offs and synergies between productivity, climate change mitigation, and soil quality. Farmers, however, often do not adopt BMPs. Identifying the barriers against adoption, and formulating ways to remove these, are core activities of the project (WP4). Catch-C will survey farmer views on BMPs in all participant countries, assess costs and benefits of implementation, identify technical and ecological bottlenecks preventing adoption, develop a decision support tool, and prioritize innovation requirements to address bottlenecks. Policy measures can promote adoption in various ways, such as voluntary measures, regulation, and economic incentives. In interaction with policy makers, Catch-C will develop (WP5) guidelines for policies that will support the adoption of BMPs; and that are consistent with regional agro-ecological and farming contexts. Dissemination (WP6) includes scientific publication; discussing project results with farmers and policy makers; making information about BMPs and their adoption available to a wider audience; and stimulating awareness about the pros and cons of BMPs for different farm types and environments in participant countries.

Supporting the role of the Common agricultural policy in LAndscape valorisation: Improving the knowledge base of the contribution of landscape Management to the rural economy (CLAIM)

The provision of public goods (including landscape services) in rural areas is recognized as one of the key topics for the future of agriculture and rural policy. Agriculture plays a major role in landscape management through its complex interlinkages with landscape features. In turn, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) remains an important driver of landscape management due to its importance as a determinant of farming activities in the EU. The main objective of the CLAIM project is to provide the knowledge base to support an effective CAP policy design in the direction of improved landscape management, particularly providing insights into the ability of landscape to contribute to the production of added value for society in rural areas. CLAIM is focused in particular on understanding and enhancing the contribution of landscapes management to socio-economic development and agricultural competitiveness in rural areas. This will be based on a pragmatic consideration of landscape services and their analysis through a mixed-method approach, taking into account the wider EU policy strategies (in particular related to innovation and the bioeconomy). The main expected result of the CLAIM project is an evidence-based policy support framework on the different and possible contributions of agriculture and the CAP to landscape management. The framework will be mainly developed and validated through a set of 9 case studies, a strong involvement of stakeholders at different territorial levels and a wide coverage of the perspectives of EU and candidate countries. The framework will finally take the practical form of a web-based manual to be implemented in accordance to stakeholders needs and indications.

FP7-KBBE, Molecular Approaches and MetaGenomic Investigations for optimizing Clean-up of PAH contaminated sites (MAGICPAH)

Objective: MAGICPAH aims to explore, understand and exploit the catalytic activities of microbial communities involved in the degradation of persistent PAHs. It will integrate (meta-) genomic studies with in-situ activity assessment based on stable isotope probing particularly in complex matrices of different terrestrial and marine environments. PAH degradation under various conditions of bioavailability will be assessed as to improve rational exploitation of the catalytic properties of bacteria for the treatment and prevention of PAH pollution. We will generate a knowledge base not only on the microbial catabolome for biodegradation of PAHs in various impacted environmental settings based on genome gazing, retrieval and characterization of specific enzymes but also on systems related bioavailability of contaminant mixtures. MAGICPAH takes into account the tremendous undiscovered meta-genomic resources by the direct retrieval from genome/meta-genome libraries and consequent characterization of enzymes through activity screens. These screens will include a high-end functional small-molecule fluorescence screening platform and will allow us to directly access novel metabolic reactions followed by their rational exploitation for bio-catalysis and the re-construction of biodegradation networks. Results from (meta-) genomic approaches will be correlated with microbial in situ activity assessments, specifically dedicated to identifying key players and key reactions involved in anaerobic PAH metabolism. Key processes for PAH metabolism particularly in marine and composting environments and the kinetics of aerobic degradation of PAH under different conditions of bioavailability will be assessed in model systems, the rational manipulation of which will allow us to deduce correlations between system performance and genomic blueprint. The results will be used to improve treatments of PAH-contaminated sites.

FarmPath - Landwirtschaftliche Transitionen: Wege zu einer regionalen Nachhaltigkeit der Landwirtschaft in Europa

In FarmPath wird davon ausgegangen, dass die Nachhaltigkeit der Landwirtschaft eher erreicht werden kann, wenn unterschiedliche Landwirtschaftsmodelle flexibel kombiniert werden können. Die unterschiedlichen Modelle reflektieren die Möglichkeiten der regionalen Kultur, Produktionsmöglichkeiten, Multifunktionalitätspotenzial, Ökologie und historische Besitzverhältnisse und Strukturen. Das Projekt soll Wege aufzeigen, wie die regionale Nachhaltigkeit erhöht werden kann. Der Ansatz ist Transdisziplinär, d.h. wir arbeiten eng mit PraxispartnerInnen zusammen. FarmPath baut auf die theoretischen Ansätze von 'Transition studies' auf, sowie auf den Ansätze von Anpassungsfähigkeit und Resilienz von landwirtschaftlichen Systemen.

LInking farmland Biodiversity to Ecosystem seRvices for effective ecological intensificATION (LIBERATION)

Subprojects: - Identifying general relationships between semi-natural habitats, on-farm management and biodiversity (WP1) - Linking biodiversity to ecosystem services on farmland (WP2) - Mitigation of biodiversity loss and promotion of ecosystem services (WP3). The next few decades will witness a rapidly increasing demand for agricultural products. This growing demand needs to be met largely through intensification (produce more from the same land surface) because there is little scope for an increase in agricultural area. Ecological intensification has been proposed as a promising solution. Ecological intensification is the optimization of all provisioning, regulating and supporting ecosystem services in the agricultural production process. As such it advocates to maintain or enhance agricultural production through the promotion of biodiversity and associated ecosystem services. The LIBERATION project aims to provide the evidence-base for the potential of ecological intensification to sustainably enhance food security with minimal negative impacts on the environment. This requires a basic insight in how biodiversity contributes to various ecosystem services and subsequently how ecosystem services contribute to yield and farm income. Key questions that will be addressed are: - How landscape structure and land-use interact in the provisioning of ecosystem services; - How farmland biodiversity is related to multiple ecosystem services; - Whether there are trade-offs between different ecosystem services; - How ecosystem services are related to farm income; - How ecosystem services may be influenced by policy measures at the local, national or EU scale. LIBERATION will focus on the ecosystem services pollination, pest control, nutrient cycling and soil fertility, thus examining both above- and below-ground ecosystem services as well as possible trade-offs and synergies. Implications for greenhouse gas emissions will be explored throughout all activities in the project. Ecosystem service delivery will be expressed in terms of (their contribution to) agricultural yield and in terms of farm income.

GMO Risk Assessment and Communication of Evidence (GRACE)

GRACE pursues two key research objectives: Firstly, it aims to provide comprehensive reviews of the existing evidence on the health, environmental and socio-economic impacts of GM plants - considering both risks and possible benefits. GRACEs review strategy will go beyond what has been done before. Reviews will be conducted in a systematic, transparent and inclusive way based on procedures originally developed for evidence-based medicine (systematic reviews). The results will be made accessible to the public via an open access database and other channels. Secondly, GRACE will test various types of animal feeding trials and alternative methods without the use of animals in order to determine how suitable they are and what useful scientific information they provide for health risk assessments of GM food and feed. At present there are different views at the EU level and between Member States on the need for and scientific value of such studies. The project will also check whether extended feeding trials can improve risk assessments compared to in-vitro, in-silico and omics methods available today. Transparency and user and stakeholder involvement and scrutiny are key features of GRACE. The project will be working closely with representatives from a broad range of stakeholder organisations as well as with professional risk assessors and risk managers. This includes planning and preparing the research activities as well as discussing the results and drawing conclusions. For this purpose, the GRACE project will organise workshops and conduct interviews and surveys and prepare feed-back reports to ensure that the information and the views of stakeholders can feed into this project. IFZ is leading the work package for user and stakeholder involvement and will also work on the core review process.

Development of an integrated biorefinery for processing chitin rich biowaste to specialty and fine chemicals (CHIBIO)

The current project proposal discloses a novel biorefinery process for a sustainable, waste free, low energy conversion route of negative value marine waste streams into high value, high performance chemical intermediates and products for the polymer industry. The project has a strong emphasis on technology development and transfer to low-tech and developing countries in the EU and associated ICPC and therefore will significantly contribute to the technological and economic leadership of the EU. The technologies disclosed in this project will foster the natural growth of sustainable economies in the EU and beyond by eliminating the need for fossil resources to preserve and exceed the current standard of living. The innovative technologies developed in this project will apply novel concepts for the production of bio-based platform chemicals that act as 'drop-ins' for existing and novel polymer production processes with high atom efficiencies. The unique assembly of the current consortium consisting of academics, SME's and large scale chemical industry partners, clearly has the scientific and technical expertise to rapidly transform laboratory based results into novel product lines at an accelerated time frame. As a part of the strategy the consortium has included Demonstration Activities as require by the FP7-KBBE-Call.

FP7-KBBE, Protection of consumers by microbial risk mitigation through combating segregation of expertise (PROMISE)

PROMISE strives for multidimensional networking thus fostering integration. The primary strategic objective of PROMISE is to improve and increase the integration, collaboration and knowledge transfer between the new member states, old member states (EU15) and candidate countries through a collaborative workplan of exchange of expertise and regional training and dissemination actions, to tackle common food safety threats. PROMISE strives for sustainability through involvement of risk communicators. A further strategic objective is to integrate stakeholders like public health authorities and national food safety authorities from the old and new member countries in order to ensure the exploitation of research results into standardisation and harmonisation efforts. PROMISE will enhance the knowledge on pathogen transmission. While legal imports are well monitored for contamination and alerts are registered through the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed RASFF notification systems, gates into the EU-27 could exist where food supply chains are not controllled. These uncontrolled imports present the risk that new strains of traditional pathogens will be transferred from third countries into the European Union. Analysing, assessing and interpreting this risk of introducing new strains of pathogens is one of the main objectives of PROMISE.

From Biodiversity to Chemodiversity: Novel Plant Produced Compounds with Agrochemical and Cosmetic interest (AGROCOS)

The consortium will discover and carry to the stage of development candidates, plant derived small molecules with potential as new cosmetic and agrochemical agents. These compounds will derive from plants originating from major biodiversity hotspots in Europe, Africa, Latin America, and the Asia-Pacific region. The starting point of the project will be a diversity-oriented natural product library of 500 compounds from the existing compound repositories of three project partners. Screening of this compound library in assay panels for agrochemical (antifungal, herbicidal, insecticidal) and cosmetic properties (UV-protection, anti-aging, anti-hyper-pigmentation) will rapidly identify promising scaffolds. This knowledge will serve as entry points for a chemotaxonomy and chemo-diversity oriented collection of plants which are thought to contain structural variants and decorations of these scaffolds. A liquid library of 3600 extracts will be generated and screened. Stringent prioritization and profiling procedures will generate 300 compounds as focused sub-libraries around the privileged scaffolds. A state-of-the-art technology platform for miniaturized natural product discovery will be used for the purpose. Evaluation of these sub-libraries will lead to 30 compounds which will undergo advanced testing to qualify 5 compounds as development candidates for novel agrochemical and/or cosmetic agents with new or improved properties over existing active ingredients. An additional outcome of the project will be an extract library with a unprecedented level of associated spectroscopic information and metadata, to be used for future purposes. The high-caliber consortium brings together international leaders in small molecule natural products, bio-prospection, leading industries in agro-chemistry, cosmetics, and spectroscopic data management and analysis. Prime Contractor: University Athens (National and Kapodistrian Univ.); Athen; Graces/Hellas.

Erhöhung des Leguminosenanteils in europäischen Fruchtfolgen (Legume-Futures)

Ziel des gesamten Projektes besteht zum einen in der Entwicklung neuer Anbau-, Futter- und Weide-Produktionssysteme mit Leguminosen, die die Umweltauswirkungen der europ. Agrar-Systeme reduzieren und zum anderen in der Durchführung sozio-ökonom. Analysen und Umweltbewertungen. Dazu wird die Forschung einen wissenschaftl. fundierten Rahmen, Strategien, Methoden und Instrumente zur Bewertung der ökologischen und ökonomischen Auswirkungen neuer leguminosenbasierten Anbausysteme aufstellen. Die spez. Ziele des Projekts sind: 1. Das Verwalten von 18 Fallstudien in Europa basierend auf etablierte Feldversuche, welche über neue Anbausystem-Designs informieren und diese validieren und die Schaffung einer Anlaufstelle für die lokale Entwicklung der Rolle von Leguminosen in neuen Anbausysteme (WP1). 2 Die Entwicklung neuer Anbausysteme für Europas pedo-klimatische Zonen durch Nutzung der Modellierung unter der Inanspruchnahme der Daten der Fallstudien, die durch das Projekt vernetzt sind (WP 1, 2, 4, und 6). 3 Die Quantifizierung der Ressourcennutzung unter Nutzung von biophysikalischen und ökonomischen Modellen (z.B. fossile Energieträger), zusammen mit den sozio-ökonomischen und ökol. Auswirkungen von kontrastierenden Anbau- und Landwirtschaftssystem-Szenarien in einem Skalenbereich (von lokal zu global) (WP 4, 6). 4 Die Identifizierung der großflächigen Umweltauswirkungen der Leguminosennutzung innerhalb der Anbausysteme (z.B. Kohlenstoff- und Stickstoff-Kreislauf, Treibhausgasemissionen, Bodenqualität, Biodiversität, Auswirkungen auf Schädlinge und Krankheiten), einschließl. der systematischen Messungen der Lachgasemissionen (WP3). 5 Die Inanspruchnahme von Daten aus bestehenden und neuen Feldexperimenten und aus Stakeholder-Interaktionen, um das Elitesaatgut einer breiten Palette von Leguminosenarten und ihrer symbiotischen Organismen im Hinblick auf ihre Eignung in den neuen Anbausystemen zu beurteilen (WP2). 6 Die Bereitstellung von bewerteten Szenarien um die Entwicklung von Lieferketten, einschließlich der Tierfütterungssysteme (für Wiederkäuer, Monogastrier, Geflügel und Fisch), zu unterstützen, basierend auf diese Anbausysteme in Verbindung mit den fortlaufenden Forschungsarbeiten im Konsortium, dem Input unserer lokalen und internationalen Stakeholder-Foren und der umfangreichen Literatur (WP1, 2, 4, 5, 6). 7 Die Bereitstellung einer ausführlichen und vollständigen Bewertung des Potenzials von Leguminosen im Non-Food-Sektor und die Auswirkung dieses Potenzials für die Gestaltung der Anbausysteme (WP5). 8 Das Erleichtern des Zugangs zur umfassenderen Wissensbasis über Leguminosen und die Verbreitung von Informationen über neue agronomische, ökologische und soziale Auswirkungen von Leguminosen in Anbausysteme (WP1, 2, 5). 9 Die Entwicklung und Verbesserung von Leguminosen-Wissensressourcen durch die Sammlung und Verknüpfung von Daten und Wissen, die zur Einrichtung eines 'European Legume Crop Biological Resources Centre' führen (WP2, 5).

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