The FIELDS project

There are new challenges and opportunities for agriculture today, driven by the climate change, the greening of the products and processes, the reuse of side-stream products, the raised complexity of the chain and the increased availability of information. However, to successfully address and react to these drivers, agriculture and forestry needs new business models and skills. The identification of existing and emerging skills needs in bio-economy, sustainability and for the use of digital technology, is of paramount importance in order to develop a strategic approach to keep the European agricultural sector competitive and sustainable in the long term. The multi-stakeholder approach in the FIELDS project, with 30 partners from 12 countries (HEI, VET providers, agricultural and forestry sector representatives and agrifood industry) will allow tackling the complexity of the issues EU agriculture faces today. The FIELDS approach, starting from the current and future trends and skills needed, will lead to a sustainable European strategy to address these skill gaps. Since agriculture issues and opportunities differs a lot from country to country, the EU strategy will be customised to have a country strategy for 7 countries. It will address country-specific actions, occupational profiles and training material to reflect the country needs while keeping EU quality standards (ESCO, EQAVET, ECVET) to address the mobility of learners through Europe concretely. An Agriculture SSA will be established during the project to build upon the regulatory frameworks and opportunities at EU and country level, while proposing concrete and practical initiatives to address skills challenges, in particular through offering modular training inside the project while guaranteeing mobility of workers within the agriculture, forestry and agrifood industry.