Long-Term Experiments As A Tool For Governing The Transition Towards New Food Systems: An Italian Trajectory

Summary

In order to face the challenges of Agenda 2030 and sustainability goals, there is an urgent need to promote transformative changes in food production, from field to market. Agricultural research should encompass all the dimensions of agriculture, at farm, landscape and food system scale, by multidisciplinary and participatory approaches. To accomplish this need, the activation of long-term processes of food system co-design can be a valuable strategy to achieve the ambitious goal of producing in a sustainable way. The Long-Term Experiments can be considered as the training ground to apply this approach for information and co-production and sharing. In this study, we present an on-going process activated in Italy, based on the connection of different local farmer-to-farmer/researcher networks through common objectives and methodology sharing.