HDHL Food4Health addresses the intertwined challenges of food and diet-related Non Communicable Diseases (NCDs) and Climate Change by fostering collaboration and aligning research efforts across food, health, and environment areas. Through a participatory approach, HDHL Food4Health widens the HDHL network and organises co-creation workshops to identify common Research & Innovation (R&I) priorities. It aims to overcome siloed approaches by coordinating activities among government, academia, industry, and citizens, enhancing societal impact at national and regional levels. Leveraging its connections with researchers, policymakers, and other relevant stakeholders, HDHL supports its members in contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by aligning food and health systems. The initiative facilitates joint funding calls and implements transdisciplinary research actions to maximise impact and address urgent societal challenges. By promoting collaboration and knowledge exchange, HDHL Food4Health aims to catalyse a shift towards healthier and more sustainable food systems, ultimately contributing to improved public health and environmental sustainability. The main objective of HDHL Food4Health is to align common R&I priorities among funding programmes by identifying research and policy needs, whilst continuing to align both with the Horizon Europe (HE) Partnerships and the needs identified by the European Commission.

ESIRA acknowledges that innovative social economy initiatives, focusing on local networks, competences, and resources, are able to recognise the important role of citizen-led activities to fulfil the needs of rural areas, especially marginalised ones. Nevertheless, many policies and initiatives fail to effectively support them and/or engage the more vulnerable groups of population. The main objective of ESIRA is to contribute to the rollout of place-based innovative social economy initiatives for rural inclusion and development in (marginalised) rural areas by supporting enabling frameworks, well-interconnected policy architecture and directly piloting innovative solutions which ultimately build more inclusive, resilient and prosperous rural areas. To achieve it, ESIRA will implement a work plan focused on (i) the research of community-led rural innovation spaces able to connect and empower actors, reinforce the social capital and sense of community, considering the great diversity of rural areas within Europe, and eventually (ii) nurturing and piloting social economy initiatives that strengthen the inclusiveness and living conditions of different groups of population in vulnerable situation, from the improvement in the provision of (social) services, economic diversification, and sustainable management of the natural capital. This will enable to (iii) stocktake and formulate recommendations for policymakers to better support the third sector and local communities, increasing the understanding of the needs and challenges of vulnerable groups of population and social economy, and (iv) boost the knowledge-exchange among local actors, building up their capacities and facilitating the scale up and replication of social economy initiatives across Rural Europe. 9 regions in 7 European countries will be involved in the project. The exploitation and dissemination activities will aim at expanding those regional spaces and replicating our concept in new regions.

BEAMING aims to raise excellence by enhancing innovation and knowledge valorisation within the bioeconomy domain through cooperation between higher education institutions, with a particular focus on Widening countries in Central-Eastern (CEE) and South-Eastern European (SEE) EU Member States and the Western Balkans. Improved global competitiveness and visibility of higher education institutions (HEI) will be achieved through establishing effective technology and know-how transfer between Widening countries and EU14 member states with more developed bioeconomies and R&I ecosystems, exploring and adopting structural reforms, educational priorities, and a culture of excellence. The BEAMING Alliance works towards 7 Specific Objectives: 1) Build the capacity of early-career researchers in all aspects of bioeconomy research; 2) Facilitate the reform of institutional practices and policy frameworks towards excellence; 3) Foster networking, knowledge exchange, and cross-disciplinary collaboration by establishing sustainable Communities of Practice; 4) Design joint research and innovation strategies and launch joint research projects; 5) Design a complex portfolio of activities for adopting Open Science practices; 6) Strengthen the valorisation of research results by increasing tech transfer capacity; 7) Support the participating institutions to move towards inclusive institutional culture, including gender equality. We aim to foster the uptake of the Quadruple Helix innovation ecosystem approach to provide a framework for higher education institutions to work collaboratively with industry, government, and civil society. Thereby, we aim to enhance their innovation capacity and the applicability of research results. Local and regional implementation strategies and roadmaps will be developed regarding the relevant ERA Policy Agenda actions in the higher education sector, particularly in the domains of bioeconomy and circular economy.

The upPE-T project aims upcycling recalcitrant oil-based plastics by bioconversion into biodegradable bioplastic for food and drink packaging production. Plastic packaging, which make up nearly 60% of the total plastic waste in Europe, is highly problematic from a waste management- and environmental- point of view due to their durability and resistance to degradation. Polyethylene (PE) and Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) are the leading plastic use in food and drink packaging (43% PE and 19% PET). The sustainable management of this plastic waste has become a very challenging problem for global society. In upPE-T we will include sustainable strategies as an alternative for plastic chemical degradation. The consortium will improve PE and PET depolymerization through enzymatic engineering to positively impact food and drink packaging recycling rate and achieving the European Union expected impact. In upPE-T we will turn PE and PET waste streams via enzymatic degradation and microbial assimilation into raw material for the production of biodegradable bioplastics. In addition, we will simplify the downstream bioplastic recovery process from cell biomass using an efficient and green extraction approach in which toxic solvents are not used. Finally, together with customers and food and drink brand owners, bio-based end-packaging will be demonstrated and validated to ensure fast market deployment. Additionally, in order to ensure 100% of PE and PET recyclability, plastic rejections not optimal for microbial bioconversion into bioplastics will be valorized by their use in building applications instead of be sent to incineration or landfilling. upPE-T will be an important part of the actions for compliance with the European Strategy for Plastics in a Circular Economy.

ClimaPannonia is the coordinated effort of key stakeholders of the Pannonian Biogeographical Area (PBS) towards strengthening the resilience of the agricultural sector and the region’s community against climate change disastrous effects. This will be achieved by enabling the widest possible uptake of tested and validated climate neutral solutions for four agriculture subsectors: (i) water-food nexus, (ii) agroforestry, (iii) organic crop production, (iv) cattle production. ClimaPannonia aims to support PBA agriculture sector in drastically improving its climate resilience. By implementing innovative systemic solutions and fostering collaboration among the six countries within the PBA – Hungary, Serbia, Croatia, Romania, Czechia, and Slovakia – ClimaPannonia will pave the way for a more sustainable and resilient agriculture. By harnessing the knowledge and expertise of leading experts in PBA and leverage the knowledge of partners from countries such as Germany, Italy, and France, ClimaPannonia seeks to ensure that the solutions implemented are innovative not only at PBA level, but also at European scale.