First ALL-Ready regional workshop held in Sevilla

The first of four ALL-Ready workshops was held in Sevilla, Spain on 2 November 2022. It covered initiatives involved in agroecology transition from Southern Europe and was a big success regarding several aspects.

Participants of Regional Workshop, Photo: Lifewatch ERIC

For the series of workshops across Europe, we had chosen the title “Accelerating Agroecology Transition: Your potential role and benefits of contributing to a European network of Living Labs and Research Infrastructures”. In collaboration with the hosts and consortium partners of the project, Lifewatch ERIC, we were able to welcome more than 40 participants from various initiatives of Andalusia, but also other parts of Spain and even Portugal. As we decided to offer a hybrid meeting, an additional number of 12 participants joined the half-day session online from different countries across southern Europe. After a welcome and introduction by Lifewatch ERIC and INRAE, we started with an interactive session that showed us where our participants came from, and in which field of agroecology they are located. Afterwards, the project coordinator of the ALL-Ready project, Heather McKhann (INRAE) gave an overview of the ALL-Ready activities and achievements, followed by an explanation of the potential future network and partnership of Living Labs and Research Infrastructures across Europe. After Muriel Mambrini (INRAE) explained the online questionnaire that was developed within ALL-Ready to situate initiatives within the transition process.

Jon Jaurguin from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural development of Andalusia gave an inspiring talk about how Andalusia is fostering its participation in the EU Partnership by dynamizing Living Labs. In the final part of the workshop, small groups of 12-14 people discussed questions related to agroecology transition. The participants debated about their focus within the transition process, faced challenges such as finding long-term funds as well as also their vision of and potential role within the future network. In conclusion, the workshop held every promise about what we hoped to achieve, from the high number of engaged participants to the great organisation, and the lively and interesting discussions with and between the participants.