Funded by the European Commission’s H2020 programme, the EURAKNOS Project, organised an online exchange between two H2020 Thematic Networks, AFINET and INCREDIBLE.
The event, which took place on 15 October, focussed on agroforestry and climate change innovations and featured presentations from three operational groups (OG) involved in agroforestry implementation. The main goal of this cross-exchange activity was to promote the involvement of agroforestry actors, but also how to maintain networking beyond the funded period.
Following a presentation of the EURAKNOS project, AFINET and INCREDIBLE project partners presented their experience in developing networks related to agroforestry and climate change, and in particular reflecting on actor involvement in their projects, including network animation through events and social media. The three OG, one silvopastoral OG from Portugal and two OG on breeding Celtic Pigs from Galicia, Spain , then presented their work and field experience.
An interactive session gave participants the opportunity to share their views on networking issues and on how the information generated should be accessible in knowledge repositories. The results of this round of questions showed how the great diversity of participants made the event a success.
The main conclusions highlighted that knowledge exchange is eased through peer-to-peer actor exchange and its networking activities, while conferences are more adequate for policymakers. According to participants, knowledge exchange is facilitated by the development of a knowledge repository and the existence of innovation brokers facilitating networking. Participants emphasised that knowledge repositories should be accurate, multi-lingual, audio-visual and with easy access. Furthermore, respondents also declared themselves to be highly motivated to maintain the repository up to date, once it has been created.
