Background: The EU Green Deal through the Farm to Fork and Biodiversity 2030 strategies aims to make Europe a climate-neutral continent by 2050 while ensuring food security. Achieving this ambitious objective will require the adoption of sustainable agricultural soil management practices. Management of agro-ecosystems to enhance both soil and subsoil organic carbon (SOC) storage could potentially be a strategy to mitigate climate change by reducing increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration. However, long-term SOC storage is dependent on many factors, especially the interactions with other nutrients. The coupled Carbon-Nitrogen-Phosphorus cycles mediates soil organic matter formation and turnover. Soil phosphorus (P) is a key nutrient for crop growth and P limitation can reduce plant and soil microbial biomass a?ecting SOC sequestration. In vitro studies have shown that the current agronomic optimum soil P concentration signi?cantly reduces nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, soil nitrogen (N) mineralisation, N immobilisation and improves prediction of C ?uxes. In particular, the gross rates of elemental transformations in soil are only poorly understood. Varying P level impacts on microbial composition and activities which are predicted to control speci?c transformation pathways within the C and N cycles in soil in?uencing the stabilisation of GHG emissions, SOC and nutrients. While the stoichiometric constraint of P on plant growth is known, the e?ects of this constraint on other soil processes at di?erent P levels is uncertain, particularly in relation to GHG emissions and N and C cycling. A number of long term P experiments in the EU and New Zealand will be utilised to investigate soil P availability on SOC sequestration and GHG emissions and CN cycling in soils. Overarching aim: ICONICA seeks to quantify the e?ect of P availability on soil C sequestration, N cycling, GHG emissions and associated soil microbial processes within managed grassland and arable systems in order to identify mechanisms for SOC and N sequestration. Data generated by ICONICA will be used to identify optimal soil P levels for SOC sequestration, minimizing GHG emissions, while maintaining crop yields from various agricultural soils. Speci?c objectives: ICONICA will employ a unique set of long term P fertilisation trials from ?ve countries, including a range of P treatments, to establish the relationship between long term P availability and (i) soil C:N:P stoichiometry, (ii) SOC stocks (SOC fractions, OM decomposability), (iii) microbiologically mediated gross nutrient transformations in grassland and arable soils with respect to SOC (iv) GHG emissions, (v) model management practices that minimize GHGs and increase SOC stocks. We hypothesize that the e?ect of soil P availability on SOC and N turnover depends on soil nutrient conditions (C:N:P ratio). We hypothesize that 1) at high soil P availability GHG emissions, in particular N2O, are increased due to increasing microbial demand for N,and 2) SOC turnover and N cycling will increase, as a result of elevated P, thus reducing the potential for SOC sequestration. The project will combine soil CNP characterisation with soil biological characterisation of long term P experiments, stable isotope tracing and modelling, soil microbial functioning. The data will be used to parameterise a CNP model to identify the optimal soil P level from a soil carbon, GHGs and agronomic perspective. Impact: An improved understanding of soil P availability on soil C and N storage, and cycling mechanisms, will provide knowledge for improving soil management practices aimed at increasing carbon sequestration and reducing GHG emissions. The project will identify the optimal soil P level to optimise SOC accumulation, GHGs and crop yields.

REDESIGN will support the transformation of local urban food systems by creating Food Value Systems (FVS). FVSs aim to strengthen urban resilience through food-led green urban and peri-urban infrastructure enhancement, foster participation in the food system of local communities (with a particular focus on vulnerable groups), contribute to the quality and beauty of living places, and mitigate climate change through the integration of urban agriculture with the built environment. The FVSs will operate through the development and application of a “Learning Loop” methodology grounded on NEB values to accelerate innovation in all the steps of the food system (including production, consumption, exchange, and disposal) and expand beyond the notion of ‘food chain’ to integrate the cultural, social and political dimensions of the transformation. The network will consist of three main groups of actors, ‘observation’ cases, ‘implementation’ cases, and a board of cities. Observation cases exemplify consolidated best practices. In the pilots, the REDESIGN Food Value Networks will be set up and implemented with the involvement of local stakeholders, particularly vulnerable groups. Each implementation case will have a specific focus on one of the domains of the urban food system (nutrient recovery and food production, the setting up of a multifunctional food lab, and food policy councils). The implementation cases will become Living Labs, through which the innovation in local food value networks will scale up at two levels: the metropolitan one, contaminating nearby districts through training and transfer, and the international one, enhancing the observation cases (closing the ‘learning loop’), and informing the board of cities for policy innovation and learning. Results will include regenerated neighborhoods in the implementation cases, the setting of three Living Labs steering the Food Value Networks, a Learning Loop methodology, all scalable and replicable in other contexts.

TUdi is conceived as a transformative project, integrating 15 academic and SME partners, to develop, upscale and disseminate soil restoring strategies in three major agricultural systems (cereal based rotations, tree crops and grasslands), different farm typologies and environmental conditions in Europe, China and New Zealand. Aimed to lead the way in improving soil health across EU, China and New Zealand, it rests on two pillars: 1) a network of 42 cooperating stakeholder organisations for defining, implementing and upscaling soil restoring strategies in multiple farms; b) a network of 66 long-term experiments and monitored farms in the participating countries. From them, TUdi will identify soil degradation situations, proven strategies for restoring soil health, and barriers and possibilities for its adoption at farm level, including gender dimensions. This bottom-up approach will develop a set of digital tools, compatible with platforms for optimizing CAP implementation in Europe, to predict the impact of these strategies on nutrient and water balance, yield, cost-benefit and farm operations. They will guide farmers in implementing strategies to restore soil health by overcoming barriers for adoption, with rigorous cost-benefit analyses central to farmer appraisal. Solutions will be scaled up over a large number of farms through partners engaged in the cooperators network, including training of stakeholders, developing technical materials and elaborating policy briefs. It will be complemented by communicating project challenges and results to society, raising awareness of the relevance of healthy soils for sustainable development. Providing a blueprint for development and dissemination of soil restoring strategies at large scale, it will contribute to key initiatives like the EU and China Research Agenda for Agriculture and EU Mission on Soil Heath and Food. Training farmers, staff and early career scientists in sustainable soil use will result in lasting legacy.