Call for Farmers to contribute to the LILAS4SOILS Project

EIT Food South is the Coordinator of the Horizon Europe-funded project “LILAS4SOILS. Fostering Carbon Farming Practices through Living Labs in the Mediterranean & Southern EU for the healthy future of European soils”. LILAS4SOILS will put in place 5 Living Labs (LLs) in 6 countries –Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Greece and Israel – to promote the collaboration among farmers, agri-food businesses, researchers and local authorities to co-create and implement Carbon Farming Practices (CFPs) in 85-100 demo-sites.

With this Open Call, LILAS4SOILS aims to select 50 additional farmers.

Focus Areas

• LILAS4SOILS will focus on the following CFPs divided into 5 categories:
  • Peatland management
    • Keeping existing peatlands wet to avoid emissions
    • Rewetting and restoring previously drained peatlands
    • Adapting the management of drained peatlands in productive use that cannot be rewetted
  • Agroforestry
    • Increasing silvoarable and silvopastoral systems
    • Hedgerow or field boundary tree cover
  • Livestock and manure management
    • Directly reducing enteric methane (including feed additives and improved feed digestibility/efficiency)
    • Reducing NO emissions through manure management (including manure storage and processing, anaerobic digestion and bio methane, and cover cropping)
    • Efficiency improvements including animal management to improve productivity (through herd management and feed management)
    • Animal fertility improvements
    • Grazing and grassland management
    • Manure incorporation into soil
  • Nutrient management
    • Improving nutrient planning
    • Improving timing and application
    • Use of nitrification inhibitors
  • Maintaining soil organic carbon
    • Cover cropping
    • Improved crop rotations
    • Maintaining grassland without ploughing up
    • Conversion from arable land to grassland
    • Organic farming
    • Management of grazing land and grassland
    • Reduced soil disturbance (from minimum tillage to no-till)

Funding Information

• Selected farmers will be compensated for their efforts in the project with 5,000 euros/year over a period of 3 years. Access to this support requires farmers to adhere to the commitments listed.

Farmers’ Commitment

• Selected farmers are expected to commit to the following conditions:
  • Provide a field of a minimum size of 1 ha for the implementation of Carbon Farming Practices
  • Provide historical data on the identified field such as production history and farming practices (i.e. fertilization and amendments, irrigation practices, tillage practices, crop rotations), and previous soil analysis
  • Discuss and agree with LILAS4SOILS Living Lab Leaders on which CFPs will be applied and maintain the agreed practices during the life of the project (3 to 4 years)
  • Work with the LILAS4SOILS Living Lab Leaders to collect soil health monitoring data and provide updates/feedback on the application of CFPs to adapt the project activities as needed (e.g.adjust timings of sampling, change combination of CFP applied, etc.)
  • Agree to share soil monitoring data in an anonymised way for learning and dissemination purposes
  • Provide access to the site(s) to selected companies specialised in Monitoring Reporting and Verification (MRV) of SOC to test their technology and provide related data
  • Participate in person to workshops or meetings organised by the Living Labs to exchange practices and experiences (estimated to 2 events per year) with other farmers and stakeholders
  • If selected as Lighthouse(i.e. sites for demonstration of best practices), lead field visits for training, peer-to-peer learning and communication related to improving soil health.

Selection Criteria

• Registered company located in a LILAS4SOILS country (France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Portugal, Spain)
• Minimum 1 ha of land must be dedicated to the application of Carbon Farming Practices
• Farm or field selected for Carbon Farming must be located in the regions of the LILAS4SOILS Living Lab
• A degree of familiarity with regenerative agriculture and carbon farming is desirable and will be preferred
• Farmers whose main source of income comes from farming (“professional farmers”) will be preferred
• Farmers that have experience with peer-to-peer learning and knowledge sharing initiatives will be preferred

For more information, visit EIT Food.