Sixth SoilCare Newsletter Published
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The 6th SoilCare newsletter has now been published and can be downloaded HERE. This issue covers a range of topics, including:
1. Developing Future Scenarios for Policy
2. New report: Demonstration activities in study sites
3. News from the field: German demonstration day of cover crops and reduced tillage
4. News from the field: Greek demonstration preventing soil loss and changing crops from oranges to avocados
5. News from the field: Italian demonstration day - deep-rooting cover crop using tillage radish
6. SICS Focus: Salinization-specific SICS
7. New SoilCare Videos
8. New SoilCare publications9. Past events/presentations
SoilCare Webinar on Future Scenarios for Sustainable Agriculture in the EU
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On April 23rd 2020, a one-hour long webinar is organised in cooperation with SoilCare partners Milieu (WP7, 'policy analysis') and RIKS (WP6, 'upscaling and synthesis') on the adoption of sustainable agricultural practices, in particular those related to improved soil quality.
The specific aim of the webinar is to obtain feedback on a set of draft narrative scenarios that have been developed based on input from the first SoilCare scenario workshop, held in June 2019, in which a group of actors from the European Commission, NGOs, farmers and farm organisations, extension services, industry and research came together to obtain a better understanding of future uncertainties regarding sustainable and profitable agriculture in Europe. They discussed the factors that would impact on the adoption of mandatory or voluntary policy measures to promote sustainable agricultural practices, scoped key drivers of change, and provided input to the developed draft scenarios.
Through this webinar, we are now seeking for input from a broader group of actors, also those not able to attend the workshop last year. The feedback received during the webinar will be used to further fine-tune and develop the narrative scenarios.
The developed narrative scenarios will provide input to the modelling and a second workshop, which will focus on assessing the impact of the scenarios on policy-relevant criteria, the barriers and enablers to take up sustainable agricultural practices and policy support.
The results from the webinar and the workshops, combined results of the modelling and the narratives, will provide input in the identification of best policy approaches tailored to different situations. We will disseminate these policy recommendations to the European Commission and to a wider audience through a report, conferences and policy briefs.
- More detailed information can be found in the Webinar information leaflet.
- If you would like to participate in the webinar or if you have any other questions, please contact us by email at Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein! or Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.
Overview of SoilCare platforms and tools
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The SoilCare project uses quite a number of different online platforms and software tools in order to support management of the project and its partners. Project partners are likely to lose track or might not know if there is support for specific tasks. Therefore an overview of the available platforms and tools has been assembled into a document. The document gives a bird-eye overview of the platforms and tools, and also lists where the tools can be found and where manuals and other resources can be found.
Since the document contains links to resources that are only available for project partners, a login is required to download the document.
Plenary meeting Budapest postponed until further notice
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[Wageningen, March 17th 2020] - Due to the corona crisis and travel restrictions throughout Europe, we have come to the conclusion that we have to cancel the SoilCare plenary meeting (which was due 15-18 June in Budapest).
It is, for the moment, too early to tell how the corona-crisis will develop, and when current restrictions could be lifted. Hence, we will not yet start planning new dates for the plenary meeting. During the coming weeks and months we will assess whether we can still have the meeting at a later date (e.g. in autumn).
We realise there may also be other restrictions for SoilCare work, e.g. for having workshops and/or doing fieldwork. Nevertheless, there are also activities that can continue (including reporting!), and perhaps novel ways can be found for tasks that cannot be done in the customary way. Please be creative and continue SoilCare work as much as possible, but of course within the rules now imposed by your government, and above all: your health should not be endangered!
To facilitate continuation of SoilCare work and keep the momentum, we will look into options to have more virtual meetings. One or more of such meetings will probably be held in the period 15-18 June (as you have all reserved these dates for the plenary meeting). Online meetings will have to be fairly short & focusing on specific topics. Perhaps we will need to go in the direction of regular virtual meetings, but with smaller audiences. We have just started thinking about this & will inform you once plans become more concrete.
We also plan to inventory what the effects of the corona-crisis on SoilCare will be for SoilCare tasks and SoilCare planning, but things are still too fresh now. In a few weeks, we will probably be better able to assess such effects. We will ask you for information on delays and other consequences at that time.
Please do not hesitate to contact us in case you have questions, or would like to discuss.
We wish you all the best in these strange and difficult times, and stay healthy.
The SoilCare management team
Rudi, Erik, Simone, Falentijn
