Empowering the future through innovative smart solutions for rural areas
FUTURAL aims to address social and environmental challenges in European rural areas through a set of digital smart solutions. In six pilot sites located all over Europe (Spain, Netherlands, Austria, Lithuania, Romania, and Greece), two community-led social, technological, and business innovations from two of the smart solution domains, will be tested and demonstrated. The five domains are:
- Circular Bioeconomy, Biodiversity and Ecosystem Management,
- Resilience to Shocks,
- Citizen Engagement and Quality of Life,
- Lifelong Education and Training, and
- Climate Adaptation and Mitigation.
Through pursuing public-private interaction, developing new social practices, and engaging rural communities, FUTURAL intends to enable widespread social change and market adoption. The development of an EU-wide Rural Innovation Forum (EU-RIF) will strengthen a network of rural organisations, initiatives, and projects to encourage the progression of a sustainable, vibrant, rural ecosystem.
Expected outcomes
- Knowledge and capacity building through workshops in rural communities
- Creating platforms for the smart solutions
- Creating a metasearch platform, integrating the smart solutions and offering matchmaking features
- Creating inclusive business models
- Elaborating policy recommendations and governance frameworks
The role of alchemia-nova
alchemia-nova will provide their expertise to develop smart solution tools in the FUTURAL domain of Circular Bioeconomy, Biodiversity and Ecosystem Management. alchemia-nova will provide the experience for resource flow analyses to create valorisation pathways for (secondary) biomass resources in the rural pilot region Pongau (Austria) and the knowledge to evaluate a biodiversity score for the pilot region Jonava (Lithuania).
Project coordinator
Agricultural University of Athens
Partnership Consortium:
alchemia-nova research & innovation gemeinnützige GmbH – ANRI
ICCS – Institute of Communication and Computer Systems
University of Pisa – PAGE Pisa Agricultural Economics
AEIDL – European Association for Innovation in Local Development
University POLITEHNICA of Bucharest
Foodscale Hub
Tecnalia
Art21 – Agrifood Tech Innovation House
IHE Delft Institute for Water Education
DLR – Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt
The Lisbon Council
Regionalverband Pongau
Municipality of Birda
Kytherian Foundation for Culture and Development
Urkiola Landa Garapena
Jonava
West-Vlaanderen
Aquatim
PREPARE – Partnerships for Rural Europe
ERCA – European Rural Community Alliance
Project status
Starts 06/2023, Duration: 48 months
Project website: https://futural-project.eu/
Call: HORIZON-CL6-2022-COMMUNITIES-02-two-stage
Topic: HORIZON-CL6-2022-COMMUNITIES-02-01-two-stage
Type of Action: HORIZON-IA
Grant Agreement Number: 101083958
Overall costs: €7.222.408,75
EU contribution: €6.985.671,25