A

Accelerator Programmes:

are short, intensive programmes that provide education, resources, and mentorship if you’re an early or mid-stage founder.

AKIS (Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems:

is the combined organisation and knowledge flows between individuals, organisations, and institutions who use and produce knowledge for the improvement of agriculture and interrelated fields.

B

Biodiversity:

is the variety of life on Earth, encompassing all living organisms from microorganisms to plants and animals, as well as the ecosystems they inhabit. In an agricultural context, it is all living things found on and around farms, including not only crops and livestock, but also the vast array of other plants, animals, fungi, and microorganisms that interact with the farm ecosystem.

Bioeconomy:

is using renewable resources like plants, micro-organisms and their waste products to produce food, energy and other industrial products, instead of using finite fossil fuels. It focuses on moving away from fossil fuel based production to a sustainable circular economy.

Biofuel:

is fuel that is made from organic materials like plants or animal waste. Examples include biodiesel made from vegetable oil and animal fats, or bioethanol made from fermented plant sugars. They serve as a renewable alternative to fossil fuels in the EU’s transport sector, helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve the EU’s security of supply.

Biomass Energy:

is renewable energy generated from organic materials that come from plants and animals. This includes anything from wood and agricultural waste to dedicated energy crops and even animal manure and sewage. Biomass energy needs to be converted from the organic material via several methods including combustion, anaerobic digestion or thermochemical conversion. Biomass energy can be used for heating, electricity generation, and the production of transport fuels.

Biopesticides:

naturally occurring biological agents used to kill pests by causing specific biological effects rather than by inducing chemical poisoning.

C

Carbon Farming:

is managing farmland and forests to remove carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere, storing or sequestering it in soils, plants and trees on the land, while also reducing the farm or forests own greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs).

Climate Smart Farming:

is an approach that helps guide actions to transform agri-food systems towards green and climate resilient practices. It focuses on implementing practices that sustainably increase production, help farms adapt to climate change and reduce farms GHG emissions while increasing their carbon sequestration capacity.

Co-creation:

is a collaborative and participatory process that brings together diverse actors, ranging from public sector employees, businesses, academia and citizens, from the outset of a project or initiative to jointly define, develop, and implement solutions to societal challenges. Co-creation focuses on a top-down model of innovation, rather than a top-down innovation model.

Community of Practice:

A Community of Practice emerges when a group of people shares a concern or passion for a specific activity and enhances their proficiency in it through mutual interaction.

Conditionality:

In order to receive EU income support, farmers must respect a set of basic rules. The interplay between this respect for rules and the support provided to farmers is called conditionality. 

CSP (CAP Strategic Plan):

is Ireland’s detailed roadmap for implementing the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) for the period 2023-2027. The key goals of the CSP are to protect famly farm incomes, improve sustainability, support rural communities, ecourage young farmers and promote agricultural innovation.

E

EIP (European Innovation Partnership) Programme:

is a European funding initiative that aims to bring together relevant parties at EU, national and regional levels to streamline, simplify and better coordinate existing financial instruments and initiatives. They focus on challenges that can benefit society, modernise sectors and markets. There are EIPs on Active and Healthy Aging, Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability, Smart Cities and Communities and Raw Materials.

The EIP on Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability, known as EIP-AGRI is a funding instrument withing the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) designed to foster innovation and collaboration among various agri stakeholders including farmers, advisers and researchers to solve regional challenges in European agriculture.

ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance):

is a framework used by businesses to assess how they perform on sustainability and ethical issues. It provides information about the sustaiability perfomrnace of a company by assessing its exposure to sustainability risks and/or its impact on people and the enviornment.

H

Horizon Europe:

is the EU’s key funding programme for research and innovation. It tackles climate change, helps to achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and boosts the EU’s competitiveness and growth.

Horticulture:

the science and practice of growing, managing, and processing fruits, vegetables, flowers, and ornamental plants.

I

Innovation:

is the practical implementation of ideas that result in the introduction of new goods or services or improvement in offering goods or services to make any process more efficient.

K

Knowledge Exchange (KE):

is the two-way exchange of knowledge, information, ideas, skills and expertise between different people, groups or organisations.

Knowledge Management:

is a range practices used by an organisation to identify, create, represent, and distribute knowledge for reuse, awareness and learning.

Knowledge Output (KO):

A unit of knowledge or learning generated, usually by or through research activity and may include new methodologies/processes, adaptations, insights, alternative applications of prior know-how/ knowledge. 

Knowledge Transfer:

is the overall process of moving knowledge between knowledge sources to targeted potential users of knowledge. Knowledge Transfer consists of a range of activities which aim to capture, organise, assess and translate knowledge, skills and know-how from those who generate it to those who will utilise it.

L

Lighthouse:

is the term given to exemplary projects or aspects within projects that support the development and knowledge exchange of transformative, innovative solutions. Lighthouses are more than successful projects. They are the top examples of innovation and best practice within their specific domain.

Living Labs:

are real life environments like towns, communities or even farms, where open innovation takes place. They integrate research and innovation activities in communities, placing citizens at the centre of innovation. They are a real-life testing ground for new ideas and technologies.

M

MRV:

is Measurement, Reporting, and Verification. It refers to the multi-step process to measure and prove that environmnetal actions are producing their intended effect. For example, the amount of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduced by a specific mitigation activity over a period of time. MRV is a crucial process in climate action, environmental sustainability and carbon accounting.

Multi-Actor Approach:

is an approach that involves all relevant actors with complementary backgrounds and expertise to co-create and share knowledge, best practices and innovative solutions responding to the needs of the users, farmers, foresters and advisors, in a bottom-up approach.

Multi-Species Swards:

swards that have a variety of plants including grasses, clovers, brassicas and herbs. When combined in a sward setting the various species root at varying depths allowing them to access more nutrients and moisture in the soil and promote better soil health and even decreased GHG emissions from grazing livestock.

O

Open Innovation:

is a strategic approach to innovation that recognises the importance of external collaboration and knowledge exchange in driving innovation. It ultimately leads to increased efficiency and effectiveness for companies who engage in open innovation. An example is a large corporate collaborating with an agile startup to develop a new innovation.

Operational Group (OG):

is the main coordination group of an EIP project. Operational Groups are intended to bring together multiple actors. In EIP-AGRI projects, OGs bring together farmers, researchers, advisers, businesses, environmental groups, consumer interest groups or other NGOs to advance innovation within their specific agricultural EIP project.

Organic Farming:

is a way of agricultural production which avoids the use of chemical inputs like artificial fertilisers, chemical plant protection products and GMOs and instead focuses on natural methods that maintain soil health, protect environmental conditions and prioritise high animal welfare standards.

P

Pilot:

 a structured and controlled endeavour or experiment to validate and test a project’s feasibility before full-scale implementation.

R

Regenerative Agriculture:

is a system of crop and/or livestock production that recognises the importance of restoring soil health and fertility, increasing biodiversity and reducing emissions. It focuses on natural ecosystems with no chemical intervention. It is often seen as a step further than organic farming, aiming to restore agricultural land to pre-modern agricultural status by working with nature, not against it.

Remote Sensing:

the measurement of an objects properties on the earth’s surface using data acquired from aircraft, drones and satellites.

Rural Development:

is improving the quality of life and well-being of people living in rural areas by investing in initiatives that support rural communities, economies and environments.

S

Startup Incubators:

help develop and refine high-potential startup ideas. Incubators often operate locally and provide a host of resources, such as physical space to access as needed, over a span of one to five years.

T

The Green Deal:

is the European Union’s plan to make Europe climate neutral by 2050. Climate change and environmental degradation are an existential threat to Europe and the world. To overcome these challenges, the European Green Deal will transform the EU into a modern, resource-efficient and competitive economy, ensuring:

• no net emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050  

• economic growth decoupled from resource use 

• no person and no place left behind

Tillage:

is the mechanical manipulation of soil through various implements, tools, or equipment to prepare seedbeds, control weeds, manage crop residues, and facilitate seed germination, root growth, and crop establishment in agricultural fields.

W

Wetland Restoration:

the manipulation of the physical, chemical, or biological characteristics of a site with the goal of returning natural/historic functions to former or degraded wetland.