Programme Category
Programme Name
Programme Description
Horizon Europe is the European Union (EU) funding programme for the period 2021 – 2027, which targets the sectors of research and innovation. The programme’s budget is around € 95.5 billion, of which € 5.4 billion is from NextGenerationEU to stimulate recovery and strengthen the EU’s resilience in the future, and € 4.5 billion is additional aid.
Identifier Code
Call
Summary
Soils are essential for the global food system and regulate water, carbon and nitrogen cycles but are put under pressure from population growth and climate change. The quality of the soil plays a central role in determining food quality as it provides the substrate and building blocks for the growth of plants and their edible food produce, which are then harvested for consumption. There is a need to build on the existing knowledge resulting from the latest EU R&I activities and infrastructures that elicit the link between soil, food, diets and human health.
Detailed Call Description
Proposed activities will:
- Further develop and strengthen legitimacy and robustness of the nexus food quality-soil through an engaged, broad and effective European interdisciplinary community of scientists (including medical researchers), innovators and practitioners, while recognising regional and national specificities, contexts and needs.
- Catalyse interdisciplinary collaboration as a holistic perspective, which is necessary to address the issues related to the topic.
- Seek and integrate qualitative and quantitative scientific evidence through in situ and lab experimentation and testing, literature review, surveys, analytical modelling (etc.) to support farming practices that positively influence the link between soil health and food quality.
- Develop easy to measure key performance indicators (KPIs) that elicit the connection between soil health, and four food quality-related characteristics (nutritional composition, tastiness, technological properties and safety).
- Adapt, integrate and demonstrate innovative methods to continuously measure the developed KPIs.
- Investigate how well current funding opportunities at all levels (EU, national, regional) address soils and human health research and innovation needs.
- Build upon existing knowledge and solutions designed and developed from previous projects such as the EIT Food initiative that addresses the challenge of soil health in a holistic way, from farm to fork, involving multiple stakeholders, highlighting their stakes in soil health and identifying potential drivers to motivate them to take action in collaboration with farmers
- Summarise the known factors influencing water, soil and plant health and how these are linked with food quality and human health.
- List the potential mechanisms for improved food nutritional quality through soil health and evaluate the current evidence.
Call Total Budget
Financing percentage by EU or other bodies / Level of Subsidy or Loan
100%
EU contribution per project: €7,00 million
Thematic Categories
- Agriculture - Farming - Forestry
- Land Development
- Research, Technological Development and Innovation
- Rural development
Eligibility for Participation
- Producer Associations
Eligibility For Participation Notes
The Joint Research Centre (JRC) may participate as member of the consortium selected for funding.
Call Opening Date
Call Closing Date
National Contact Point(s)
Research and Innovation Foundation
29a Andrea Michalakopoulou Street, 1075 Nicosia
T.Th. 23422, 1683 Nicosia
+357 22205000
Email: support@research.org.cy
Dr Angelos Ntantos
Scientific Officer
Telephone: 35722205033
Email: antantos@research.org.cy
Dr Ioannis Theodorou
Scientific Officer
Telephone: 35722205038
Email: itheodorou@research.org.cy
(Publish Date: 05/01/2022-for internal use only)
EU Contact Point
European Commission, Directorate-General for Research and Innovation
https://ec.europa.eu/info/departments/research-and-innovation_en#contact