ECO-READY: 1st call for establishing a Living Labs Network

ECO-READY Living labs will bring knowledge and explore the issue of how to better inform policy formulation and enhance public understanding on the nexus of food resilience, climate change and biodiversity. The Open Call will be open until 30th September 2023.

About the ECO-READY Project

Ensuring a sustainable and resilient food supply in the face of climate change requires all hands-on deck. The ECO-READY project will develop a real-time surveillance system, an Observatory offered as an e-platform and as a mobile application. This will function as the necessary singular source of information, provide real-time assessments for the food system, and update forecasts frequently and consistently.

The Observatory will be available to society, policymakers, the scientific community, and the agri-food industry, and integrated with a network of at least 10 Living Labs, supported through the third-party funding process, covering all bioclimatic regions in Europe, forming the ECO-READY project knowledge infrastructure.

ECO-READY aims to develop knowledge-based resilience strategies and tools for tackling immediate problems and long-term challenges simultaneously. The Living Labs network will co-create regional scenarios, develop policy recommendations, contingency plans, and resilience strategies, and embed them on the Observatory.

ECO-READY will use AI to develop early warning systems and decision support tools. This will involve European farmers and society’s interests in policymaking, increasing awareness for climate-adaptive and mitigating agri-food products. The Observatory smart application will empower citizens to engage in policy making and interact with the scientific community, farmers, and industry, driving change in consumption habits.

ECO-READY 1st Open Call Details

The ECO-READY Open Call for establishing a Living Labs Network aims to attract scientific, community and commercial agri-food stakeholders including EU ministries and agencies for education, agriculture, environment, farmers, farm advisor organizations, industry, retail and consumer representatives, research and innovation collaboration networks, academia and civil society organizations.

The ECO-READY Open Call aims to:
• Provide short- and long-term local case studies for resilience building strategies across a broad geographical distribution.
• Connect different types of LLs (geographical, climatic, thematic) to share knowledge and tackle interdisciplinary problems related to food security and resilience.
• Form a lasting partnership between the network of Living Labs and the Observatory for easier data collection and exchange.

The Open Call will be open from 31/05/2023 until 30/09/2023.

WHO CAN APPLY?

Eligible stakeholders to participate in the call for third party funding and establish Living Labs include EU ministries and agencies for education, agriculture, and environment, farmers and farm advisor organizations, industry, retail and consumer representatives, research and innovation collaboration networks, academia and civil society organizations.

The LLs must be composed of 2-5 partners and at least:

1 scientific or technical or commercial,
and at least 1 community of users.

Partners in the LLs should be specialized in one or more of the following sectors:

food security,
biodiversity,
climate change.

Information about the eligible countries is described in detail in the official Guidelines for applicants.

Overall eligibility criteria for the ECO-READY Open Call

Open Call for LL’s will be open to all legal applicants eligible Horizon Europe countries funding.
All applicants must have a valid VAT number and must be active and operational.
Partners cannot participate in more than one consortium applying for the call by means of exclusion. If an applicant participates in more than one proposal, then all proposals will be considered as ineligible.
Existing consortium members of ECO-READY project as well as their and their affiliated entities are not eligible for the Open Call of ECO-READY.
The proposal must be delivered before the defined deadline, applying the requested submission procedure.
Proposals shall only ask for funding for that part of the work that is not yet accomplished and will be carried out after having been selected for funding. Of course, this does not exclude the usage of e.g., results, IP, infrastructures or approaches already held by the applicants.
Proposals need to align with the ECO-READY Open Call requirements concerning the choice of bio-climatic regions and products scope.

ACTIVITIES TO BE FUNDED

The Living Labs will:

Investigate product types (food products & crops) and create model-based scenarios.
Test the scenarios relevant to climate-related challenges, such as: exposure to climate shocks, management of water and land resources etc.
Contribute to the development of contingency plans for selected food products for ensuring food supply & security.
Provide input to data-driven policy recommendations.
Co design/ deploy awareness raising plans.
Form a lasting partnership with the Observatory for easier data collection and exchange.

The sub-projects performed by the selected Living Labs will last for 24 months and will be divided into 3 phases:

Design- Deliver an activity plan (May 2024-October 2024)
Development- Implement the activities/ Demonstrate the results and outcomes (November 2024-September 2025)
Impact- Finalize activities and draft a sustainability plan (October 2025-April 2026).

WHERE TO SUBMIT YOUR APPLICATION

The ECO-READY application form is available on the Open Call Hub platform , which is the unique entry point for all application submissions to the first ECO-READY Open Call. Submissions received through any other channel will be automatically discarded.

Applications must be submitted in English and before the official deadline: 30th of September 2023.

Documents required in subsequent phases will be submitted via dedicated channels, which will be indicated by the ECO-READY consortium in the contracting phase.

FUNDING AND PAYMENTS

The funds provided through the Open Call come directly from the funds of the Horizon Europe Project ECO-READY, which is funded by the European Commission under Grant Agreement Number 101084201.

In order to receive funding, any selected proposal will sign a dedicated Sub-Grant Agreement with the ECO-READY consortium.

The implementation of sub-projects performed by the selected Living Labs will last for 24 months and will be divided into 3 phases:

Phase 1: Design- Deliver an activity plan M1- M6
Phase 2: Development- Implement the activities/Demonstrate the results and outcomes M7-M17
Phase 3: Impact – Finalize activities and draft a sustainability plan M18-M24

Each of the 3 phases will be completed with submission of deliverables, which summarized the work done during that phase, namely an Activity plan resulting from Phase 1, Demonstration of results /outcomes as a result of Phase 2, and a Final report with a sustainability plan as a result of Phase 3.

USEFUL INFORMATION AND ADDITIONAL MATERIALS

For further questions and clarifications, you may check and address the following ways:

ECO-READY Open Call
ECO-READY Open Call Summary
ECO-READY Open Call Applicants Guide
ECO-READY Open Call Model Sub Agreement

The full Open Call kit is available on the website for download.

ECO-READY CONSORTIUM

The Eco-Ready consortium is a collaborative powerhouse of expertise. It brings together leaders in food security, biodiversity, climate change impacts, food systems vulnerability, and adaptation modeling, as well as social sciences and consumer research. With a proven track record of co-creation and stakeholder engagement, Eco-Ready effectively communicates with policymakers, businesses, scientists, consumers, and society as a whole. This project is committed to its goal of driving positive changes for a sustainable future.