CORE ORGANIC PLUS · Coordination of European Transnational Research in Organic Food and Farming Systems

Organic agriculture is considered to be one of the important development pathways for improving agriculture’s relation with the environment while at the same time ensuring food safety and future food security. This role is dependent on continuous research and innovation.CORE Organic Plus will continue, update and consolidate the series of transnational research calls which support a focused and coordinated research and innovation effort covering the most important and pertinent challenges along the organic value chains. Moreover, the effort will - where relevant - combine research and innovation in primary production with development in processing techniques, value adding and market and consumer research. Thematic research areas for a joint call will be selected by the participating national funding bodies and the European Commission and in consultation with national and transnational stakeholders such as TP Organics.The CORE Organic network will be expanded with Romania and Poland, and 22 countries are taking part in the Plus call. One large joint call with 3-4 thematic areas will be launched with co-funding from the Commission. Moreover, within the Plus project, the partners will prepare for the next research programme based on an update of the priorities for research and innovation. The project will assist and advise the on-going and initiated research and innovation projects in their stakeholder involvement and dissemination efforts in order to secure high impact of the research and innovation efforts. The impact of the research and the increased monitoring efforts will be assessed after the end of the projects.Looking to the future, CORE Organic Plus aims to further improve the European Research Area by delivering results that can be used to develop the organic sector throughout Europe and the world.