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Horizon Europe is the financial instrument supporting Research & Innovation in the EU, implementing the Innovation Union policy, a European flagship initiative aimed at enhancing Europe's global research competitiveness. Horizon Europe is an EU funding programme for research and innovation which will run from 2021 to 2027 inclusive with a proposed budget of €95 billion.
Five Mission areas have been identified under Horizon Europe, each with a dedicated Mission Board and Assembly. They will help specify, define and implement specific Missions within this new funding program. The 5 Mission areas are;
• Adaption to climate change including societal transformation
• Cancer
• Climate neutral and smart cities
• Healthy oceans, seas, coastal and inland waters
• Soil health and food
Furthermore, there will be partnerships of these being of interest to the Agri-food sector. The list of partnerships has not been finalised yet but is expected to include, antimicrobial resistance, infectious animal diseases, agro-ecology living-labs and a sustainable blue economy among others.
DAFM and specifically the National Contact Point for Horizon Europe will engage fully in preparing the Horizon Work Programmes and work to promote and engage with the Partnerships and the Soil Mission.
Horizon Partnerships play a crucial role in advancing agri-food research and addressing the complex challenges faced by the agriculture and food sectors. These partnerships bring together diverse stakeholders, including researchers, farmers, industry experts, policymakers, and consumers, to collaboratively tackle issues related to sustainable agriculture, food production, and food security. By pooling resources, expertise, and knowledge, Horizon Partnerships enable the development of innovative solutions that improve agricultural practices, enhance crop productivity, and promote sustainable food systems.
Agri-food research within Horizon Partnerships is vital for ensuring the resilience and sustainability of our food production systems. Through collaborative efforts, these partnerships facilitate the exploration and adoption of cutting-edge technologies, such as precision agriculture, and digitalisation, which can revolutionise farming practices and enhance productivity while minimising environmental impacts. Additionally, agri-food research conducted through Horizon Partnerships addresses key issues like soil health, water management, biodiversity conservation, and the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the agricultural sector. By prioritizing agri-food research within Horizon Partnerships, we can make significant strides towards achieving a more sustainable, resilient, and equitable global food system that meets the needs of a growing population while safeguarding the environment and ensuring food security for all.
Under Horizon Europe, the European Union's research and innovation framework program, Soil Missions have emerged as a significant initiative to address the challenges and opportunities related to soil management and sustainable land use. These missions aim to promote the understanding, protection, and restoration of soils in Europe through interdisciplinary research and collaborative efforts. With the recognition that healthy soils are fundamental to food security, biodiversity conservation, climate change mitigation, and overall ecosystem functioning, the Soil Missions within Horizon Europe have become instrumental in advancing soil science and policy.
The Soil Missions under Horizon Europe emphasise the need for integrated and holistic approaches to soil management, combining scientific knowledge with innovative technologies and stakeholder engagement. These missions focus on a range of objectives, such as mapping and monitoring soil health and degradation, developing sustainable agricultural practices, implementing soil restoration strategies, and promoting soil-related education and awareness. By mobilising resources and expertise across different sectors, including academia, industry, and civil society, the Soil Missions aim to foster knowledge exchange, promote best practices, and facilitate the adoption of evidence-based policies for sustainable soil management across Europe. Through these efforts, Horizon Europe's Soil Missions contribute to the conservation of soil resources, ensuring their long-term productivity and resilience while fostering a transition towards more sustainable and environmentally friendly land use practices.
SCAR is a broader setting used to discuss all agricultural research; it is not limited to Horizon 2020 topics. It meets several times per year in different formats, depending on the topic or level. It is a group of high level officials from around Europe providing advice to the Commission and other MS in relation to research for agriculture, food, fisheries and the Bioeconomy. DAFM is coordinating Irish involvement in SCAR.
The Joint Programming Initiative on Agriculture Food Security and Climate Change (FACCE-JPI) brings together 21 member countries and New Zealand (associate member) who are committed to building an integrated European Research Area addressing the interconnected challenges of sustainable agriculture, food security and impacts of climate change.
FACCE-JPI provides and steers research to support sustainable agricultural production and economic growth, to contribute to a European bio-based economy, while maintaining and restoring ecosystem services under current and future climate change.
The FACCE JPI has five core research themes:
-Sustainable food security under climate change, based on an integrated food systems perspective modelling, benchmarking and policy research perspective.
-Environmentally sustainable intensification of agricultural systems under current and future climate and
resource availability.
-Developing synergies and reducing trade-offs between food supply, biodiversity and ecosystem services.
-Adaptation to climate change throughout the whole food chain, including market repercussions.
-Mitigation of climate change: nitrous oxide and methane mitigation in the agriculture and forestry sector, carbon sequestration, fossil fuel substitution and mitigating GHG emissions induced by indirect land use change.
The Governing Board of the FACCE-JPI adopted its 2016-2018 Implementation Plan in November 2015. The Implementation Plans updated the first FACCE-JPI Strategic Research Agenda in 2012 taking into account scientific advances as well as FACCE-JPI’s own achievements and the international policy context. The new updated FACCE-JPI SRA 2016 has updated the content of the five Core Themes andlisted a number of priority actions, taking better account of the socio-economic aspects and the need for impact.
Ireland through DAFM and Teagasc are represented on the Governing Board of the FACCE-JPI. Arising from Irelands’ proactive involvement in the FACCE JPI a number of funding opportunities are available to Irish Researchers to help address the scientific challenges of the five FACCE JPI core research themes, including the ERA-Nets ERA-Gas, SusAn and WaterWorks.
The Joint Programming Initiative a Healthy Diet for a Healthy Life (JPI HDHL) brings together 20 countries that align research programming and fund new research to prevent or minimise diet-related chronic diseases.
The research area focuses on the links between nutrition and health, as well as nutrition-related public health interventions and aims to enhance co-ordination of research investment in these areas. The vision of the JPI HDHL is that by 2030 all citizens will have the motivation, ability and opportunity to consume a healthy diet from a variety of foods, have healthy levels of physical activity and that the incidence of diet-related diseases will have decreased significantly.
DAFM and the HRB participate in the Management Board of the JPI HDHL and participate as funders in various research. For more information on the JPI HDHL, please use the following link:
DAFM participated in the recent JPI HDHL Call 2023: New Food Resources and Technologies to improve public health and food security (FOODRETEC). The FOODRETEC Call 2023 is now closed.
Additional Guidelines for Irish Applicants to the Call 2023 can be viewed in the document below.
The Department is represented on, and contributes to, the European Joint Programme on Agricultural Soils (EJP Soil). As part of DAFM’s commitment to strengthening European research collaborations under Horizon Europe (HEU), the department contributes to a range of strategic research initiatives under DAFM’s International Outreach Research Strand.
The European Joint Programme (EJP) on Soils that aims to overcome current fragmentation in research and to accelerate the potential of agricultural soils to contribute to climate change adaptation and mitigation. In parallel, it is also tasked to create an integrated framework for agricultural soil research in Europe to enhance capacity, capability, and knowledge in soil research, and to contribute to the Soil Mission under Horizon Europe.
EJP SOIL is a European Joint Programme Cofund on Agricultural Soil Management contributing to key societal challenges including climate change, water and future food security.
The objectives are to develop knowledge, tools and an integrated research community to foster climate-smart sustainable agricultural soil management that:
• Allows sustainable food production
• Sustains soil biodiversity
• Sustains soil functions that preserves ecosystem services
The main aim of EJP SOIL is to develop a sustainable framework for an integrated community of researchers working on related aspects of agricultural soil management. The major aspects of knowledge on agricultural soil management to be addressed are:
1. Strengthen the European research community on agricultural soil management through a concerted alignment of research, training, and capacity building;
2. Co-construct a roadmap for agricultural soil research with stakeholders;
3. Fill the identified knowledge gaps by fostering research projects and synthesis through the organization of internal and external calls;
4. Build human and institutional research capacity through targeted training end network building;
5. Create harmonised soil information systems and foster their contribution to reporting through a combination of methodological transnational activities and research projects using geodatabases and combining soil information databases with remote sensing and models; and
6. Support European policies on agriculture and climate by providing a scientific underpinning.
The EJP SOIL programme targets key societal challenges such as;
• Food and water security
• Sustainable agricultural production
• Climate change adaptation and mitigation
• Ecosystem services delivery
• Biodiversity preservation
• Human health and well being
Further information can be found and details about current open research call’s:
EJP SOIL website: https://ejpsoil.eu/
EJP SOIL Online submission tool: https://ejp-soil.ptj.de/call2
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Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine
The US-Ireland R&D Partnership is a tri-jurisdictional alliance between Ireland, Northern Ireland and the United States which was officially launched in 2006. Its aim is to promote collaborative innovative research projects which create value above and beyond individual efforts. InterTradeIreland provides support and facilitates arrangements between the various funding partners involved in the US-Ireland R&D Partnership initiatives.
Agriculture and the US-Ireland Research and Development Partnership
Since 2016 the scope of the Partnership has been extended to include agriculture research focused on selected priority areas – this has resulted in Ireland and Northern Ireland based researchers being able to compete with US-based researchers in selected areas.
The following partner agencies provide research funding in the Agriculture thematic area in the US-Ireland R&D Partnership:
• In the United States (US), the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) , within the US Department of Agriculture
• In the Republic of Ireland (RoI), the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM)
• In Northern Ireland (NI), the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA)
It is under the Agricultural and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) Foundation Programme, one of NIFA’s major competitive grant programs through which it addresses critical societal issues, that US-Ireland tripartite applicants have an opportunity to compete for awards but limited only to the scope of the stated priority areas for the US-Ireland R&D Partnership.
For detailed Call information, please see here .
The Department of Agriculture Food and the Marine (DAFM) and New Zealand’s Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) have established a 3-year pilot Joint Research Initiative (JRI) over the period 2022 to 2024 in recognition of the strong existing research connections and the common challenges facing the agri-food sectors in both Ireland and New Zealand.
The pilot Joint Research Initiative goal is to provide Joint Research Calls that build on the established research links between Ireland and New Zealand, strengthen existing cooperation and collaboration between funders and researchers on a bilateral basis, align research priorities and activities, and exploit synergies where they exist.
Joint Calls are funded by DAFM and MPI and will address research related to high/medium-intensity grassland livestock systems, the impact of such systems on the climate and the environment, and the necessity to identify and implement research outputs and outcomes to enable the sector’s climate actions and transition to climate neutrality.
JRI competitive research calls are open to Irish scientists and researchers from eligible Research Performing Organisations (RPOs) to develop collaborative research proposals with research partners from New Zealand. It is also possible for Irish RPOs to partner with industry and other stakeholders, and with institutions from other countries/networks on a self-financing or in-kind basis.
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) – through its Co-operative Research Programme (CRP) – has opened a call for applications to fund research fellowships and attendance at international conferences (such as workshops, congresses and symposia) in 2020.
The CRP is supported by 24 of the 34 OECD member countries (including Ireland) and operates under four themes:
- Managing Natural Capital for the Future
- Managing Risks in a Connected World
- Bio - Based Industries
- Transformational Technologies and Innovation
The CRP supports travelling fellowships from six to 26 weeks for established scientists and supports conferences/workshops on issues relevant to the programme and OECD.