ICT-AGRI-FOOD | Fast Track to Innovation Workshops - 19 November 2020, 26 November 2020 and 10 December 2020

This workshop aimed at connecting research, institutions, private and public sector and other stakeholders along the value chain of the agri-food sector, from the ICT-AGRI-FOOD community and beyond.

 

An ICT-AGRI-FOOD’s Knowledge Incubator Programme Workshop: “Fast track to innovation”

 

One of the ERA-NET ICT-AGRI-FOOD’s major aims is to be the pivotal point connecting research, institutions, private and public sector and all stakeholders along the value chain of the agri-food sector.

Our network development uses a multi-actor approach to emphasize the potential connection between the ICT-AGRI-FOOD Cofund and relevant stakeholders.  These include the private sector and thematically related initiatives such as EIP-AGRI; the Thematic Smart Specialisation Platform on Agri-food (TSSP-AF, https://s3platform.jrc.ec.europa.eu/agri-food) and related interregional partnerships under the Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialisation (RIS3).  The connection should allow and facilitate a transfer of innovation to various stakeholders. This workshop has the goal to accelerate the movement of solutions from our funded projects to the market.

To reach this objective, ICT-AGRI-FOOD developed, together with the innovation agency Berlin Thinking, a concept for a series of three consecutive events:

Knowledge Forum on 19 November 2020

The core objective of this forum was to exchange best practices from successful large-scale innovation projects and to work on a joint vision among the most relevant European research and innovation actors. We used this event to bring all relevant actors in the field together and get them in touch with representatives of 19 selected research projects of ICT-AGRI-FOOD in the area of agri-food tech. We aimed to increase resource efficiency, pace and impact of research projects in agri-food tech by making use of existing best practices, tools and platforms as well as fostering synergistic collaboration with key actors like the Joint Research Council’s (JRC’s) S3 Platform, Digital Innovation Hubs (DIH), EIP-AGRI, EIT Food and the ERA-NET ICT-AGRI-FOOD.

Panel 1: Meet European Agrifood innovation actors

During this first session, we aimed to exchange on best practices from successful large-scale innovation projects and to work on a joint vision among the most relevant European research and innovation actors.

10:10 - 10:20 CET
ICT-AGRI-FOOD - Support for agrifood tech research projects
with Dr. Johannes Pfeifer, Coordinator at ICT-AGRI-FOOD

Presentation

10:20 - 10:30 CET
JRC's S3 Smart Specialisation Platform - Vision for Agrifood R&D
with Dr. Katerina Ciampi Stancova, Coordinator for Agrifood at S3 Platform

Presentation

10:30 - 10:40 CET
S3 High Tech Farming - Vision for Sustainable Precision AgTech
with Fabio Boscaleri, Coordinator at S3 High Tech Farming

Presentation

10:40 - 10:50 CET
EIP-AGRI - Vision for orchestrated agrifood innovation
with Willemine Brinkman, Deputy Team Leader at EIP-AGRI

Presentation

10:50 - 11:00 CET
SmartAgriHubs & IoF2020 - Best practices of EU pilot projects
with Dr. George Beers, Project Director at SmartAgriHubs and IoF2020

Presentation

11:00 - 11:10 CET
DEMETER - Best practices of EU innovation project
with Kevin Doolin, Project Director at DEMETER

Presentation

The presentation were followed by an interactive discussion, below you will find the questions that were asked during this discussion round as well as the video of this panel.

  • Q1: Many names, many organizations and many projects, but how to streamline the communication of relevant results towards the actual end-users and customers like farmers and companies in the agrifood value chain?
  • Q2: How does your organization/project help to scale relevant solutions for the European market? What are you offering to support new research and innovation projects?
  • Q3: How does your organization/project contribute towards the creation of digital single market for smart agrifood solutions?
  • Q4: How do you see the role of the different European innovation actors like DIHs, ERA-NETs, EIPs, EITs, EIC etc. in agrifood and how can they help to preserve and communicate research results and learnings from temporary projects?
 

Panel 1: "Meet agrifood innovation actors" | 10:10 - 11:40 CET

 

ict_agri_panel_1_play.jpg
 

Panel 2: Meet the agrifood industry
The second session aimed to foster the usage and further development of existing tools for data exchange, ecosystem mapping, communication and many other challenges developed by other agrifood innovation projects.

11:45 - 11:53 CET
ATLAS – Interoperability for the digital Agriculture
with Stefan Rilling, Project Coordinator at ATLAS

Presentation

11:53 - 12:01 CET
Djust Connect - Consent management for fair data sharing
with Jurgen Vangeyte, Project Manager at Djust Connect

Presentation

12:01 - 12:09 CET
AIOTI - IoT data marketplace for agrifood
with Tom de Block, WG on Distributed Ledger Technologies at AIOTI

Presentation

12:09 - 12:17 CET
FIWARE - Standard context broker & system-of-systems
with Harald Sundmaeker, Vice-chair Smart Agrifood MSC at FIWARE

Presentation

12:25 - 12:33 CET
NEFERTITI - European network of demonstration farms
with Adrien Guichaoua, Project Director of NEFERTITI

Presentation

12:33 - 12:40 CET
IoF2020 Ecosystem Mapping and Farm2Fork Fitness Programme
with Nadim Choucair, Sustainability Expert at IoF2020

Presentation

The presentation were followed by an interactive discussion, below you will find the questions that were asked during this discussion round and the video of this panel.

  • Q1: Which important tools, standards and platforms do you recommend reusing to the upcoming agrifood innovation projects?
  • Q2: In how far can portals like the IoT Catalogue and the SmartAgriHubs Innovation portal help to bring research results to market? How will this offer be kept sustainable and available in the future?
  • Q3: Sustainable impact of solutions is key for agriculture in the coming year considering our ambitious goals of the farm-to-fork strategy. How can we better measure sustainable impact and design service that foster a sustainable food chain?
 

Panel 2: "Learn about tools and platforms" | 11:45 - 13:00 CET

 
 

ict_agri_panel_2_play.jpg
 

 

Panel 3: Learn about platforms, tools and methodologies

During the third session we aimed to get the view of farmers as well as machine manufacturer and their demands and offers for collaborations with research projects in the future.

14:00 - 14:08 CET
AEF - Providing electronic communication to the Ag sector
with Norbert Schlingmann, General Manager of AEF

Presentation

14:08 - 14:16 CET
IoF2020 IoT Catalogue - Explore agrifood IoT solutions
with Bruno Almeida, CEO at Unparallel Innovation

Presentation

14:16 - 14:24 CET
SmartAgriHubs Innovation Portal - The agrifood network
with Mark Hage, Senior Developer at Schuttelaar & Partners

Presentation

14:24 - 14:32 CET
EIT Food - Europe’s leading food innovation initiative
with Begoña Pérez-Villarreal, Innovation Hub Director in Southern Europe at EIT Food

Presentation

The presentation were followed by an interactive discussion, below you will find the questions that were asked during this discussion round as well as the video of this panel.

  • Q1: What can research projects improve to make their results more attractive for farmers and distribution collaborations with machine manufacturers?
  • Q2: What is a good way to reach and inform all relevant stakeholder about new innovations and their performance and impact?
  • Q3: How can we specifically support SMEs to grow internationally and really benefit from a digital single market?

Panel 3: "Meet value chain actors and networks" | 14:00 - 15:00 CET

 

ict_agri_panel_3_play.jpg

 

Individual Workshops on 26 November 2020

In this interactive workshop, members of 14 of 19 ICT-AGRI-FOOD research projects worked in small groups to determine their support needs in terms of product development, monetization, sustainability and communication. Each of the three sessions took about two hours where representatives from each research project filled in an interactive mural to identify relevant partners.

Partnership Event on 10 December 2020

ICT-AGRI-FOOD invited the research project partners to meet many different stakeholders and to introduce the research projects in three minutes pitches not only to the agri-food innovation ecosystem but also to each other. In three different thematic rooms focussing on Product Development, Communication and Sustainability, the research project representatives and the audience had the chance to exchange and to break-out into individual meetings with interested partners. The videos of the pitch session from each project can be find on the project pages.