Missions as a
strategic tool in
Horizon Europe:
ROLE OF MISSION BOARD FOR SOIL HEALTH AND FOOD
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zita KriaučiūnienėMember of Mission Board Soil Health and Food
Vytautas Magnus University Agriculture Academy
Bio-based Industries Info day
MITA, Vilnius, Lithuania, 6 May 2020
What are missions and mission areas?
• Partly inspired by the Apollo 11 mission to put a man on the moon, the European R&I missions aim to deliver solutions to some of the greatest challenges facing our world.
• They are an integral part of the Horizon Europe framework programme beginning in 2021.
• Individual missions will be chosen from the 5 mission areas that were identified during the negotiations of Horizon Europe.
Research and innovation missions under Horizon Europe
Missions are a “portfolio of excellence-based and impact driven R&I actions across disciplines and sectors” and should
be bold and inspirational, with wide societal relevance;
indicate a clear direction: targeted, measurable and time-bound;
be ambitious but realistic research and innovation actions;
spark innovation across disciplines, sectors and actors;
be based on a bottom-up approach of multiple solutions
1st Mazzucato report (2018)
https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/info
/files/mazzucato_report_2018.pdf
Examples of missions in Mazzucatoreport
100 carbon neutral cities by 2030
A plastic-free ocean
Decreasing the burden of dementia
Adaptation to climate
change, including societal
transformation
Cancer
Healthy
oceans,
seas, coastal
and inland
waters
Soil health
and foodClimate-neutral
and smart cities
5 mission areas
Why a mission in the area of Soil Health and Food?
Sanskrit Vedic Scriptures, 1500 BCE
Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1937
Leonardo da Vinci
Why a mission in the area of Soil Health and Food?
Mission Board
The importance of soil health and food
• Land and soils are essential for all life-sustaining processes on our planet.
• They are the basis for the food we grow as well as for many other products such as feed, textiles, or wood.
• Soils also provide a range of ecosystem services which are important for clean water, supporting biodiversity or for cycling nutrients and regulating climate.
The importance of soil health and food
• Soils are highly dynamic and fragile systems - and they are a finite resource. It can take up to 1,000 years to produce 1 cm of soil.
• Soils are facing pressures from an increasing population with demands on land for production, settlement and industries.
• Soils are also heavily affected by climate change, erosion and sea level rises. Approximately 33% of our global soils are degraded and in the EU, erosion is affecting 25% of agricultural land.
Aims of the mission in area of soil health and food
• A mission in the area of soil health and food will provide a powerful tool:
• to raise awareness on the importance of soils,
• engage with citizens,
• create knowledge and develop solutions for restoring soil health and soil functions.
• This will allow full use of the potential of soils to mitigate the effects of climate change.
• Action on land/soils is critical to meet political commitments such as the United Nations Sustainable Development Agenda SDGs and new European Commission’s Green Deal and its ambition to progress on climate, biodiversity and sustainable food.
Soil health and food - Who is involved?
Mission area managed across EU Commission services:co-lead by DG AGRI and DG RTD + DGs CLIMA, ENV, JRC,MARE, SANTE, ENER and MOVE
Secretariat provided by DG AGRI
Creation of Mission Board to develop ideas for one or morepossible missions in the area of soil health and food
Mission board can be supported by members of a MissionAssembly
Member States involved through (shadow) ProgrammeCommittee and national activities
Stakeholders and citizens will contribute to thedevelopment and implementation of the mission through co-design, co-implementation and co-assessment
Cees
VEERMAN (NL)
Teresa PINTO-CORREIA (PT)
CatiaBASTIOLI (IT)
BorbalaBIRO (HU)
JohanBOUMA (NL)
EmilCIENCIALA (CZ)
Bridget Anne
EMMET (UK)
Lachezar Hristov FILCHEV (BG)
Emile Antoine FRISON (BE)
AlfredGRAND (AT)
Marta POGRZEBA (PL)
Jean-François SOUSSANA (FR)
Zita KRIAUČIŪNIENĖ (LT)
Carmen VELA OLMO (ES)
Reiner WITTKOWSKI (DE)
Soil health and food – Mission Board
Chair Vice-Chair
Members of the Sub-Group ‘Soil health
and food’ of the ‘shadow’ Strategic
Horizon Europe Programme Committee
from Lithuania
Dr. Žydrė Kadžiulienė, Lithuanian Research Centre for Agriculture and Forestry
Aušra Gribauskienė, Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Lithuania
Members of the Mission Assembly for
Soil Health and Food
22 members from: Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Switzerland, France, Ireland, Germany, Estonia, Netherlands, Italy et al.
Mission area Soil Health and Food in tandem with other instruments
Mission Area
Soil Health and Food
Partnership on
Food systems
EJP Soils
Carbon sequestration in agricultural soils in EU
e.g. Nutrition and safety issues mediated through soils
Partnership on
Agroecology
e.g. Agroecologicalapproaches to soil management
Where are we in the process of developing a mission?
Ten meetings of the mission board including a foresight workshop (three remote)
• Develop common understanding of concept of missions and scope of mission area
• Discussions on vision mission “tagline”, indicators and targets for a mission
• Develop “sound bites” for communication and justification of a possible mission
•Spreading the message
• Develop plan for communication and citizen engagement
• Attending Horizon Europe R&I Days and many other events to communicate and engage on the mission area
• Building mission board “mirror groups” in Member Sates
Sept. 19
May. 5
A systems’ approach to mission area “Soil Health and Food”. A mission to…
address the various soil functions
benefit all types of land use
take into account the diversity of EU-territory
engage with a range of stakeholders (e.g. farmers, foresters, land owners, public authorities, citizens)
work at different scales (e.g. farm, forests, landscapes)
take into account the global footprint of soil and land management in Europe
Graph from LANDMARK project
What next in 2020
Starting point:Mission tagline
Test tagline againstmission criteria:
Do we have indicators, targets?
How do we use mission tagline for communication and citizen engagement?
1
2
3 End May:Propose mission + activities
What would be the non-R&I content?
What would be the R&I content?
A roadmap to restore soil health and to reach the goals of the European Green Deal and of the United Nations Sustainable Development Agendafor healthy food, people, nature and climate
External communication and engagement:
mission impossible!
EIP-AGRI newsletters, flash news and
twitter account - #EIPAgriSoil campaingarticles
14th February 2020
survey- sent to more than 7000 contacts - 2000 contributions received so
far- translated in DE, FR
Salon d’Agriculture, Feb 2020
Thank you!
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zita Kriaučiūnienė
Member of Mission Board Soil Health and Food
Vytautas Magnus University Agriculture Academy
# HorizonEU #EUmissions #MissionSoil
© European Union, 2019. | Images source: © darkovujic, #82863476; © Konovalov Pavel, #109031193; 2018. Fotolia.com
http://ec.europa.eu/horizon-europe
