Participants were chosen from H2020 projects, that contribute to the most to research for rural communities with each of them contributing to a specific policy (agricultural, rural or urban); representatives from the European Commission: policy officers following the topics/ projects (DG AGRI); colleagues from other policy DGs and other executive agencies that have an interest in on-going activities/projects in the sector and REA and EASME project officers following the project.
The session started with a brief introduction by the Research Executive Agency and continued with a short, 4-minute presentation of 17 projects, including COASTAL.
After the presentations, project members were grouped into 3 different discussion groups as follows:
- Rural areas today: SIMRA, RUBIZMO, ROBUST, POLIRURAL, RURACTION
- Rural areas of the future: MATILDE, IMAJINE, RURITAGE, DESIRA, RURALISATION, SURE FARM
- Governance in rural areas: RELOCAL, LIVERUR, MOVING, SALSA, LIAISON, COASTAL
Project partners had a chance to discuss several topics including, how to involve different stakeholders in your project, what are the challenges encountered when engaging with actors.
It was also a great networking opportunity, especially to foster synergies and collaboration between coordinators, policy officers and project officers.