We are in search for partners to work on HORIZON-MISS-2024-SOIL-01-02

Living Labs in urban areas for healthy soils

TOPIC ID: HORIZON-MISS-2024-SOIL-01-02

Type of grant: Call for proposals

Topic description

Activities under this topic respond directly to the goal of the Mission ‘A Soil Deal for Europe' of setting up 100 living labs and lighthouses by 2027 to lead the transition to healthy soils by 2030. It supports the Soil Mission specific objectives, in particular the following ones: 3 “No net soil sealing and increase the reuse of urban soils”, 4 “Reduce soil pollution and enhance restoration”, 5 “Prevent erosion”, and specific objective 8 “Increase soil literacy in society across Member States”.

Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following outcomes:

• Increased capacities for participatory, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary R&I across EU Member States and Horizon Europe Associated Countries, allowing for effective cooperation and collaboration among research, practice and policy to co-create and test solutions for soil health.
• Enhancement of soil health in rural or urban areas where living labs are deployed, based on an established monitoring framework.
• Practice-oriented knowledge, tools and techniques are more easily available to urban communities, local city councils/regions and land managers and contribute to an enhanced consideration and uptake of effective solutions for soil health and related ecosystem services across across neighbourhood/communities, territories and sectors, in regions where the selected living labs are operating.
• Policy makers in the EU and Associated Countries are more aware of local needs and differences with regards to soil health and can use this knowledge to design more effective policies.

While more research is needed to restore and maintain healthy soils in the EU and Associated Countries, an important barrier still encountered to accelerate the transition towards a climate-neutral and green European Union is the gap between science and practice, between knowledge and implementation. The Mission ‘A Soil Deal for Europe’ proposes a novel approach to research and innovation in the area of soil health, including the implementation of living labs. Living labs have the potential to empower a green transition towards healthy soils by developing solutions in a co-creative manner and involving actors in real life settings at territorial level to achieve large-scale impact.

Please, visit the following page to get more information regarding this call: https://www.developmentaid.org/grants/view/1290926/living-labs-in-urban-areas-for-healthy-soils?useNavigation=true