Climate change and more extreme weather conditions make it necessary to strengthen the resilience of European agriculture and make more efficient use of resources such as water, nutrients and land. The EU project MIXED, launched on October 1, therefore investigates the advantages of mixed agricultural and agroforestry systems in terms of climate, environment and society.
Mixed systems improve several parameters simultaneously (biodiversity, climate and sustainability in general) and are characterized by interdisciplinary cooperation and less specialization on individual farms. They can take many forms, such as a mixture of livestock, crops or trees and can take place within a field, a farm, between farms or even within an entire landscape or food chain.
The aim of MIXED is to create networks of researchers and farmers throughout Europe covering a wide range of different mixed agricultural and agroforestry systems during the four-year project period. In addition, a basis of scientific knowledge about the different methods and systems is to be created, which will help making the European agricultural sector in a sustainable direction.
MIXED, led by Aarhus University (Department of Agroecology) and the International Centre for Research in Organic Food Systems is funded by EU Horizon 2020. The Institute for Rural Development Research and the ‘Arbeitsgemeinschaft Schwäbisches Donaumoos’ form the German part of the network of 19 partners in ten European countries.
Contact person at IfLS: Simone Sterly (sterly[at]ifls.de)
