Get to know us a bit more
European agriculture is experiencing an acute ageing of its farming population as well as insufficient generational renewal. About a third of European farm managers are over 65 y.o. and only 12% are below 40. In Galicia, a region in NW Spain, the situation is more critical, with only 6.6% farm managers below 40 y.o. and almost 50% of them over 65.
Fig. 1. Farm managers in Europe, Spain and Galicia aged above 65 and below 40 in 2020.
Succession has traditionally been the most common means to start a farming career, but this pathway is in decrease due to many reasons. On the contrary, new entrants (NE), people starting in farming without agricultural background, may constitute an alternative to this issue. Also, they are said to be more innovative, promoting shorter food chains, applying new technologies and production methods, compared to successors or remaining farmers. Still, many new entrants face different barriers compared to successors such as access to farmland, knowledge, budget, housing, etc.
In response to that, TERRACTIVA Operational Group aims at developing a toolkit for local organizations to leverage their support actions to NE in agriculture, particularly in agroecology.
TERRACTIVA partners are currently working on the development of different guidelines to increase awareness and up skill local organizations supporting NE in their installation and their socio-economic position, bringing special attention to access to land. One of the pillars of our project is the involvement of farmers and the rest of stakeholders on it, enabling us to understand what the main issues NE are experimenting and that need to be tackled are. Our group is at the fore of the investigation of this profile in our region and the results and tools obtained during and after the development of the project will be useful for next groups or associations working on the support of new entrants.
 |
 |
Fig. 2a and 2b. Pilot web from Mariñas-Betanzos LAG and SIX-web.
Intermediate results include the identification of new entrants’ issues and pathways - to assess their situation in Galicia almost 90 NE were identified and characterized-, the compilation of inspirational mechanisms in other EU regions focused on supporting these agents, or the development of an interactive GIS-Web with relevant information. Another outstanding output will be the creation of a peer-to-peer network managed by advisors and technicians, with NE and existing farmers for information and knowledge exchange.
Here you can check some inspirational projects compilation (In Galician).
The project was inspired by the EIP-Agri Focus Group: New Entrants into farming (check here their final report) which proposed to upgrade the sources of information and tools focusing on NE into agriculture.
Fig. 3. One of our NE, Charline.
TERRACTIVA partnership brings together a dynamic and complementary set of organizations.
The VET Centre Fonteboa is in charge of the coordination and communication. Its close contact and longstanding experience with agricultural students has shown how difficult it is for those without agricultural background in their families to become farmers. Fonteboa joined forces with the LandLab of the University of Santiago de Compostela, with consolidated expertise in the domain of land mobility and the Juana de Vega foundation, which has been carrying out an Entrepreneurship Program in the agrifood sector during the last 15 years. Besides, the Horsal cooperative has been supporting de facto dozens of NE in horticulture and aims to upgrade its approach to leverage this process. Finally, the LAG Mariñas-Betanzos is trying to foster a local food system in a metropolitan area where farming has been under threat due to urbanisation. NE are now the opportunity to recover food production in the area, with increasing demand for organic products. The LAG is responsible for a pilot action, implementing the first adaptation of the support toolkit to its territory. [SCROLL for more info about all partners.]
At the moment, all efforts are dedicated to the conclussion of the last guides of our toolkit and also to the preparation of the workshops and webinar, i.e. the most important actions in communication.
 |
Fig. 4. Inspirational experiences compiled by Terractiva.
Last year, we had the oppotunity to participate in a Cross-visit organiced by the EU-CAP Network which also permited us share our work with other OG, meet other participants in different countries and fields of work, and get inspired by them. Click here for more info.
 |
Fig. 5. Part of the group representants at the Azienda Agricola Bio Florriddia in Toscana during the Cross Visit.
You can check our websites by clicking on the logos. Also, we provide you with some of our social networks:
Partners
| EFA Fonteboa Association - VET Centre |  |
|
| Mariñas - Betanzos Local Action Group |  |
|
| Juana de Vega Foundation |  |
|
| Horsal Cooperative |  |
|
| LaboraTe (Land Lab) - University of Santiago de Compostela |  |
Collaborators
| Slow Food Compostela |  |
|
| HortaEco | ||
| Granxas de Lousada Farm |  |
