Boosting Adult Education In Organic Farming Erasmus Project

Project Title

Boosting Adult Education In Organic Farming

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for adult education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Agriculture, forestry and fisheries; Intercultural/intergenerational education and (lifelong)learning

Project Summary

According to FAO and WHO ,,Codex Alimentarius”: organic farming (OF) is comprehensive system of production management that supports sustainability in agro-eco-systems incl. biodiversity, biological cycles and soil biological activity.” The focus is on domestic resource mobilization in the farm with minimizing external investments. The biological system takes into account the fact that the regional (local) conditions require agricultural system, adapted to the specific region. One of the way to achieve that is continuous adult education of the farmers (in other words lifelong learning – LLL) in agricultural, biological and technical approaches of organic farming as opposed to synthetic inputs.
BioFarm project aims to improve the adult educational level in the field of organic farming. Organic Farming (OF) contributes to sustainable rural development, environmental protection and ensures better conditions for quality livestock production. OF is a specific production method that maintains the ecological balance and manufactures products covering the principles of ecological cycles of plants – animals – soil.
The idea of organic farming existed a long ago, but a state policy for its development was applied from the last decade. Much of farmers oriented to organic production are facing problems and lack of knowledge in this area. OF as a concept and practice is constantly evolving and for its sustainable development it is necessary, the current and future farmers and their teachers to have the opportunity to enrich and improve their level of knowledge through the LLL programs.

The objective of the project had been envisaged to be accomplished through a set of training in OF which was specifically prepared and implemented for the project. The topics of the training were according to the newest trends but also necessities for OF and refer on:
OF and interdisciplinary approaches, the educational, legal framework and knowledge system of organic production in the project countries, participatory action research with farmers, introduction to OF, legislation and the certification process of organic production, market of organic products, networking of agricultural producers and associations – horizontal and vertical linking in the range of values.
The training for the participants who were interested in and professionally in organic farming had been designed as their content had been tailored to the specific agro-ecological conditions of the countries of the consortium and the needs of the farmers. Beside, BioFarm website was created for easy access to educational materials.
Some of the farming practices for organic production of plant and animal products and marketing of organic products in partner countries had been explored.
Building strategic partnership enabled the development and implementation of innovations in the field of adult education, exchange of best practices to enhance the skills of workers in the field of organic production and shortening the distance between farmers and educational platforms in this sphere.

Expectations were that the project implementation would be enabled also employees in the education sector of agricultural to benefit directly from the website-platform for learning and sharing of best practices in organic farming, which would improve their level of knowledge and would join them to a larger professional community.

Project Website

https://proje.cu.edu.tr/biofarm/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 77671,9 Eur

Project Coordinator

UNIVERSITY OF CUKUROVA & Country: TR

Project Partners

• UNIVERSIDAD POLITECNICA DE CARTAGENA
• Association for Internationalization of Education and Science
• Kolegji ILIRIA
• UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI FIRENZE