Call: User-oriented solutions building on environmental observation to monitor critical ecosystems and biodiversity loss and vulnerability in the European Union
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Programme | |||||||||
Acronym | HORIZON-CL6-GOVERNANCE | ||||||||
Type of Fund | Direct Management | ||||||||
Description of programme "Horizon Europe - Cluster 6 - Destination 7: Innovative Governance, Environmental Oberservations and Digital Solutions in Support of the Green Deal" | Transformative changes such as the ones required within the Green Deal are dynamic processes that require appropriate governance. At the same time, to ensure coordination and for collaborative decision-making, governance requires multiple channels and networks that provide readily available data and information coming from different sources. R&I activities under this destination aim at both: experimenting with new ways to govern the transition process and modernising the governance, in particular by making information and knowledge available and accessible. R&I for governance to support the Green Deal shall provide insights into institutional barriers such as lock-ins, path dependency, political and cultural inertia power imbalances and regulatory inconsistencies or weaknesses. Innovative governance supporting the Green Deal objectives needs to recognise, cope with and promote resilience in the face of on-going shocks and disruptions both globally and across Europe, whether these be climatic, ecological, economic, social, geo-political or related to health. Critical risk assessment and reduction strategies need to be incorporated, including the diversification of infrastructures, resources and knowledge through more self-sufficiency and autonomy. Taking advantage of the use, uptake, deployment and exploitation of environmental observations[[The capacity to observe the environment, including space-based, in-situ-based (air, sea, land) observation, and citizen observations]] as well as digital solutions, assessed through the “do not harm” principle of the Green Deal, is key for innovative governance models and a more science-based policy design, implementation and monitoring. To maximise impacts of R&I on the ground and spark behavioural and socio-economic change, the knowledge and innovation produced throughout the whole cluster should be widely disseminated to key stakeholders of the relevant sectors of the cluster. In particular, the Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems (AKIS) needs to be reinforced to accelerate the required transformative changes. Data and information obtained through Environmental Observation is of great value when assessing the state of the planet and is delivering crucial information to support the Green Deal and the climate and ecological transition. Integration of this information from different sources (space-based, airborne including drones, in-situ and citizens observations) with other relevant data and knowledge while ensuring (better) accessible, interoperable or deployable information, delivers information necessary for shaping the direction of the development of policies in the broad context of Cluster 6 of Horizon Europe. A strong link to the European Earth observations programme Copernicus (in Cluster 4) and the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Earth observation programme, as well as support to the Group on Earth Observations (GEO), its European regional initiative (EuroGEO) and the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) is foreseen for topics on environmental observations under this destination. R&I activities relevant to ocean, seas and coastal waters will complement and support the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development and UN Decade on Restoration, the G7 Future of the Seas and Oceans Initiative, the pan-Commission Destination Earth initiative, the European Global Ocean Observing System (EOOS) and the GOOS 2030 strategy. Digital innovation, in complementarity with Cluster 4 and Digital Europe Programmes activities, should bring benefits for citizens, businesses, researchers, the environment, society at large and policy-makers. The potential of the ongoing digital transformation, and its wider impacts, positive and negative, need to be better understood and monitored in view of future policy design and implementation, governance, and solution development This destination will develop innovative digital and data based solutions to support communities and society at large, and economic sectors relevant for this cluster to achieve sustainability objectives. R&I activities will add value to the knowledge and cost-effectiveness of innovative technologies in and across primary production sectors, food systems, bioeconomy, ocean and biodiversity. Knowledge and advice to all actors relevant to this cluster are key to improve sustainability. For instance, primary producers have a particular need for impartial and tailored advice on sustainable management choices. Knowledge and Innovation Systems are key drivers to enhance co-creation and thus speed up innovation and the take-up of results needed to achieve the Green Deal objectives and targets. This will include promoting interactive innovation and co-ownership of results by users, as well as strengthening synergies with other EU Funds in particular the CAP, reinforcing the multi-actor approach and setting up structural networking within national/regional/local AKISs. AKIS goes beyond agriculture, farming and rural activities and covers environment, climate, biodiversity, landscape, bio-based economy, consumers and citizens, i.e., all food and bio-based systems including transformation and distribution chains up until the consumer. Expected impacts Proposals for topics under this destination should set out a credible pathway to contributing to innovative governance and sound decision making in policy for the green transition, and more specifically to one or several of the following impacts:
When considering their impact, proposals also need to assess their compliance with the “Do No Significant Harm” principle [[as per Article 17 of Regulation (EU) No 2020/852 on the establishment of a framework to facilitate sustainable investment (EU Taxonomy Regulation)]] according to which the research and innovation activities of the project should not be supporting or carrying out activities that make a significant harm to any of the six environmental objectives of the EU Taxonomy Regulation. Topics under this destination will have impacts in the following areas: “Climate change mitigation and adaptation”; “Clean and healthy air, water and soil”; “Enhancing ecosystems and biodiversity on land and in water”; “Sustainable food systems from farm to fork on land and sea”; “High quality digital services for all”; and “A Competitive and secure data-economy”. Social innovation is recommended when the solution is at the socio-technical interface and requires social change, new social practices, social ownership or market uptake. | ||||||||
Link | Link to Programme | ||||||||
Call | User-oriented solutions
building on environmental observation to monitor critical ecosystems and biodiversity loss and vulnerability in the European
Union | ||||||||
Description of call "User-oriented solutions building on environmental observation to monitor critical ecosystems and biodiversity loss and vulnerability in the European Union" | Expected Outcome: A successful proposal will support the delivery of services and solutions for the implementation of the European Green Deal and the biodiversity strategy, through the deployment and exploitation of environmental observations, benefiting a broad range of end users and helping them restore biodiversity and ecosystems under threat, thus contributing to the global observation and monitoring of the living realm. Proposals are expected to contribute to at least four of the following outcomes:
Scope: The projects are expected to further the harmonisation, mobilisation, and uptake of monitoring and environmental data to better characterise and understand the natural and anthropogenic pressures on biodiversity, the extent of the destruction of natural biological resources and its connection with ecosystem conditions within safe planetary boundaries. There is a need for knowledge of both better quantified and more precisely characterised changes in biodiversity and related ecosystem services (in coastal, marine, terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems), and of ecosystem status and quantified impacts of the main direct drivers of changes (i.e. land and sea use changes, pollutions, climate change, invasive alien species and exploitation of natural resources) on European natural capital. The projects should deliver new Earth observation (EO) data services building on the potential of EO capabilities in order to address end-user needs facing the deterioration and destruction of their living environment and ecosystems. The projects under this topic should tackle issues raised within the European Green Deal calls and provide solutions to halt biodiversity loss and protect vulnerable ecosystems, and ensuring ecosystem capacity to continue to provide services to society and the environment. The projects should make mapping tools and information solutions available, which are needed by a wide variety of end users in order to meet targets for conservation and restoration of diverse terrestrial, coastal and marine ecosystems. Hence, the development of tools to support decision-making and participatory management are crucial in this context. Solutions related to improving ecosystem health and resilience should be integrated into best practice monitoring activities within respective monitoring governance schemes. This should enable stakeholders and policy makers to take the right conservation and restoration measures, in particular with the use of a holistic ecosystem-based management in response to the urgent need for halting biodiversity loss and, consequently, alterations to ecosystem functions and sustain the delivery of precious ecosystem services. Building on existing services and frameworks provided through GEO, EuroGEO, European research infrastructures, European Ocean Observing Systems, EMODnet, Copernicus, ESA Earth Observation programmes and EGNSS, this topic should address the downstream part of the value chain to support mitigation and adaptation to climate change impact on biodiversity and ecosystems. The consortia should engage with end users and stakeholders, contribute to customising of data and exploitation platforms, deliver scaling-up and replication of existing service models, and brokerage of knowledge and dissemination to the public. The successful proposals should build on outcomes of EU funded projects such as Horizon 2020 projects like ECOPOTENTIAL, initiatives like EuropaBON and programmes like LIFE, and should feed into the EC Knowledge Centre for Biodiversity, and deliver usable results to the monitoring framework of the EU biodiversity strategy for 2030. | ||||||||
Link | Link to Call | ||||||||
Thematic Focus | Research & Innovation, Technology Transfer & Exchange, Capacity Building, Cooperation Networks, Institutional Cooperation, Clustering, Development Cooperation, Economic Cooperation, Climate, Climate Change, Environment & Biodiversity, Circular Economy, Sustainability, Natural Resources, Green Technologies & Green Deal, Administration & Governance, Agriculture & Forestry, Fishery, Food, Disaster Prevention, Resiliance, Risk Management, Rural & Peripheral Development, Regional Development & Regional Planning | ||||||||
Funding area | EU Member States Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs) | ||||||||
Origin of Applicant | EU Member States Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs) | ||||||||
Eligible applicants | Public Services, Federal State / Region / City / Municipality / Local Authority, National Government | ||||||||
Applicant details | eligible non-EU countries:
At
the date of the publication of the work programme, there are no countries associated to Horizon Europe. Considering the Union’s
interest to retain, in principle, relations with the countries associated to Horizon 2020, most third countries associated
to Horizon 2020 are expected to be associated to Horizon Europe with an intention to secure uninterrupted continuity between
Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe. In addition, other third countries can also become associated to Horizon Europe during the
programme. For the purposes of the eligibility conditions, applicants established in Horizon 2020 Associated Countries or
in other third countries negotiating association to Horizon Europe will be treated as entities established in an Associated
Country, if the Horizon Europe association agreement with the third country concerned applies at the time of signature of
the grant agreement.
Legal entities which are established in countries not listed above will be eligible for funding if provided for in the specific call conditions, or if their participation is considered essential for implementing the action by the granting authority. Specific cases:
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Project Partner | Yes | ||||||||
Project Partner Details | Unless otherwise provided for in the specific call conditions , legal entities forming a consortium are eligible to participate in actions provided that the consortium includes:
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Further info | Proposal page limits and layout: The application form will have two parts:
Page limit - Part B: 45 pages | ||||||||
Type of Funding | Grants | ||||||||
Financial details |
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Submission | Proposals must be submitted electronically via the Funding & Tenders Portal Electronic Submission System. Paper submissions are NOTpossible. |
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