<< Background >>Among the 6 European Commission priorities for 2019-24, the European Green Deal is listed as first. According to the aim, Europe wants to be the first climate-neutral continent by becoming a modern, resource-efficient economy. In order to achieve this, there is an evident need to boost the efficient use of resources and to restore biodiversity and reduce pollution. Agriculture and food systems must be transformed away from wasteful, energy-hungry and exploitative approaches.Towards the European Green Deal objective, Regenerative Agriculture (a generic term covering also Conservation Agriculture and Biodiversity Enriching Agriculture) can offer substantial results for sustainable farming by enhancing biodiversity “above and below the ground surface”, thus contributing to increased water and nutrient use efficiency and to improved and sustained crop production. Regenerative Agriculture (RA) proposes new farming techniques that supersede the current concept of conventional agriculture and proposes sustainable management of the soil with significant environmental and economic benefits, especially suitable for arable crops. RA gives farmers the means to conserve and make more efficient use of natural resources, thus offsetting the destructive forces of agriculture against biodiversity. In the medium term, RA has also been proved to bring economic benefits to the farmer (like increase of yields, reduction of off-site problems, labour and fuel savings, as well as cost-savings in annual crops). According to ECAF (European Conservation Agriculture Federation) the environmental benefits of implementing Regenerative or Conservation Agriculture are substantial, undoubtedly contributing to the mitigation of climate change. These benefits include improvement of soil properties, increase of biodiversity, decrease of erosion or less CO2 emissions. Despite the number of obvious benefits, the adoption of RA is slowly spreading across Europe. Although the extent of RA lands has almost doubled from 2008 to 2018, it still counts only for around 3,5% of the total arable land and permanent cropland (www.ecaf.eu). There is also a considerable difference in the scope of adoption and RA practices between the EU members. While for example in Slovenia, the share of RA compared to the total arable land is almost 11%, in Ireland, Italy and Greece this ratio is around 3% (the EU average), and in Hungary (a country with a traditionally long history of agriculture) this rate is only 0,11%, one of the lowest in Europe. (ECAF, Eurostat 2018). These significant divergences support the high need of exchanging good practices and improving the farmers’ knowledge of and attitudes toward RA. Indeed, one of the main limitations is the lack of knowledge and skills on the topic. The proposed project will contribute to these needs by offering opportunities for knowledge and skills to students of Higher Education (future agronomists and farmers’ advisors) but also to farmers themselves and prospective farmers, who attend secondary vocational education.By aiming to introduce new practices, such as RA, not widespread in the EU, but popular in North and South America (https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fsufs.2020.577723/full) the project aims to contribute to the urgent need to mitigate climate change through wise farming practices that help to conserve natural resources. Moreover, this project answers to the need for more knowledge and exchange of good practices by involving in the education effort 3 tiers of education, namely Higher, Secondary and adult education, aiming to diffuse the knowledge created in HE to the community more widely, and to the farming community more specifically. Innovative education methods and ICT tools will facilitate this effort and ensure transferability of knowledge and outreach to a broad range of target groups.<< Objectives >>The need to re-direct agriculture towards innovative approaches that would help to mitigate climate change is urgent and pressing. Students in the fields of agronomy, but also agroforestry and rural development, should be suitably equipped to look at such innovative approaches, which are often stemming from traditional methods, suitably revisited and redefined, so that they can lead, as professionals, the effort towards mitigating climate change. At the same time, farmers should be also helped, through non-formal and informal learning, to understand how they can change their farming methods to make them more environmentally sensitive, using natural resources wisely, without losing income. Regenerative agriculture (RA) proposes new farming techniques that supersede the current concept of conventional agriculture and proposes sustainable management of the soil with significant environmental and economic benefits, especially suitable for arable crops, thus offering farmers the means to conserve and make more efficient use of natural resources. The overall aim of this project is to create learning material, in the form of courses that can be taught face-to-face and online to agronomy students (and related fields of study) at university level, to vocational secondary education students of agriculture (and related fields) and to farmers and farmers’ advisors. The project objectives include: •Promote the principles and practices of RA across Europe. •Research and report on the already existing good practices of RA in the project countries and across Europe, identifying problems and attitudes that hinder further development of RA; as well as benefits for the farmers, that need to become more widely known; and create an RA Library of information, which will be constantly updated. •Create and pilot-test in HE a new and flexible methodology and educational content, for delivering RA courses to students of agriculture and related disciplines, with a view to equip future agronomists and related professionals with knowledge and skills to become leaders in RA, helping farmers to adjust their everyday practices accordingly.•Adapt and pilot-test the HE methodology, learning content and tools, so they meet the needs of secondary education students in agriculture and related professions; as well as the needs of non-formal adult learners, especially targeting farmers. •Design an interdisciplinary, digital open learning environment for all 3 tiers of education, hosting the learning resources created by the project, and offering interaction possibilities with local and national stakeholders and farmers’ communities, with the prospect of continuously enriching these resources through the active involvement of users.•Prepare and publish a Guidebook on RA Learning, addressing tertiary and secondary students and educators, trainers, advisors, other stakeholders in the field of agriculture and farmers themselves. •Disseminate widely the project products and results, through the dedicated REGINA platform and through the publicity and communication efforts of all project partners.<< Implementation >>The activities of the project are developed along 6 interconnected steps, which lead to a cohesive set of project products through the collaborative effort of the project partners. The activities are: A. Research and documentation of best practice on Regenerative Agriculture (RA) on the five participating countries and across Europe, so that a Library of information can be crated to support the educational activities of the project and provide a solid basis for designing a Higher Education learning programme that can be in turn diffused more widely to the education community and the community at large, by transferring existing and new expertise and knowledge to be created through the project. To create the additional knowledge that is needed to achieve the objectives of this project, surveys will be conducted amongst RA stakeholders, such as farmers' associations, national and regional authorities, development agencies etc, to provide documentation of the experience of these organisations and their views on the potential of RA. Moreover, a survey of good practice will provide documentation of the private farmers' achievements in the field of RA; and a survey of farmers in the project countries will help to identify their readiness for taking up RA and the problems and benefits they foresee by taking up this type of agriculture. B. Cooperative work amongst the partners to define the best learning methodology and learning tools that can serve the aims of the project, i.e. that can be applied at University level introducing innovative elements, but can also be diffused to the wider community of education and the community of farmers, to spread the benefits to society at large. The project proposal sets framework of requirements that should underlie such methodology and learning tools, so that they can be subsequently adapted to other tiers of education, being flexible and holistic. Moreover, ICT facilities and services will be created and educationally exploited through the project, specifically designed for the requirements of the devised methodology and its transferability to different education tiers, namely secondary education and non-formal adult education of farmers. C. Cooperative work amongst the project partners will examine carefully all the documentation collected through research, which will be complemented by the existing expertise of the partners and associated partners, and guided by the methodology already devised by previous activities, leading to the creation of learning content, initially for university students in the targeted disciplines and specialisations; and subsequently for secondary vocational school students in the field of agriculture and related subjects. D. Devising a set of ICT tools, to be hosted in an online learning platform, will be central to the implementation of the adopted learning methodology and the delivery of the learning content, serving the needs of students at all targeted tiers of education. This involves a series of activities that include technical expertise by ICT staff, expertise in creating eLearning courses addressed to Higher Education, secondary education and Adult learning; and expertise on delivering eLearning, especially to adults (farmers) who are not often ICT competent and need a special approach to bring them into using effectively ICT for learning. E. Piloting activities follow the consolidation of the learning content and learning tools, so that both the learning methodology and content will be refined and shaped in the most suitable way to serve the needs of learners. The piloting will extend to all targeted tiers of education and will concern both face-to-face courses and eLearning.F. Preparation of step-by-step instructions on the use of the REGINA online platform and the learning tools and learning content included in it; and publication of a Guidebook for teachers and learners which will be integrated in the online platform for easier use.<< Results >>The project results (PR) to be achieved by the project are: 1.Building a library of good practice in Regenerative Agriculture (RA) to use in multi-tier learning. This PR aims to create a library of information, including best practice in the participating countries and across Europe, to be integrated in the learning products and the learning process in the 3 targeted tiers of education, i.e. Higher, Secondary and Adult learning.2.Design a learning methodology and tools. This PR aims to design a learning methodology and appropriate innovative learning tools to introduce an interdisciplinary course of study on RA for university students, adaptable for secondary school study and adult learning, addressing major issues of our time focused on global climate change, soil health and enhanced ecosystem services, as well as food and water security.3.Create learning modules for Higher Education students, who attend, e.g. Agricultural engineering, Agricultural sciences, Agronomy, Environmental sciences, environmental engineering, Crop production, grassland management, Animal breeding, Soil science, but also sustainable rural development, regional planning and rural sociology4.Create learning modules for Secondary Vocational Education students, training young prospective farmers in RA and the main theoretical issues underlying such practices, but also in technical and practical issues that they will be called to fend when they start practicing.5.Create learning modules for non-formal Adult Education, by adapting the learning content for the previous two tiers, to shape a non-formal training schedule, suitable for farmers wishing to take up RA or improve their RA practices. For this, a short list of modules will be selected, and will be simplified and shortened, to shape a course that can be delivered both online and face-to-face, lasting no more than 30 hours. 6.Publication of a Guidebook on Regenerative Agriculture Learning, to provide a step-by-step guidance to teachers, advisors and students who wish to benefit from the online REGINA platform and the learning products it includes. 7 multiplier events are also planned, 5 national (one in each participating country) and 2 international, i.e an International conference and an online international webinar. A training of trainer’s seminar is also foreseen for the staff of the participating organisations.Certain intangible results are foreseen:The implementation of REGINA project is expected to contribute to high quality teaching in universities through an interdisciplinary approach, encouraging collaborative and integrative learning on the topic of RA. Also, it is expected to achieve high quality teaching and learning that addresses secondary education and adults. Moreover, a strong benefit is the diffusion of Higher Education knowledge to other tiers of education and the community at large, including the farming community. An additional result is the know-how exchange and collaboration between different stakeholders, such as education institutions, policy makers, local development agencies and social partners, representing the civil society in each country and in Europe more widely in the field of agriculture and farming. Such collaboration is of vital importance for bridging the gap of knowledge and bringing innovation to the primary sector, thus helping the spread of RA practices and their contribution to the mitigation of climate change. Moreover, by taking part in the project, teachers and researchers will improve their networking and knowledge-transfer opportunities, and they will increase the possibilities to see their education products applied more widely. On the other hand, farmers will gain knowledge on new -to them- sustainable methods and solutions for crop and land management issues, through direct contacts with the research and education sector.