Mar 11, 2021

PRIMA-Call out now! Call for pre-proposals in April 2021!

On March 5th, 2021 PRIMA - Partnerships for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean Area launched a call for project outlines (10 pages). The overall objective of the PRIMA programme is to build research and innovation capacities and to develop knowledge and common innovative solutions for agro-food systems, to make them sustainable, and for integrated water provision and management in the Mediterranean area, to make those systems and that provision and management more climate resilient, efficient, cost-effective and environmentally and socially sustainable, and to contribute to solving water scarcity, food security, nutrition, health, well-being and migration problems upstream. It is possible to submit proposals in 2 sections with 3 topics each:

Topic 1 – Management of water
Topic 2 – Farming System
Topic 3 – Agrofood Value Chain

Deadline for submission of pre-proposals is 21.04.2021.
Joint projects of at least 3 partners from three countries, with at least 1 participating EU member state and at least 1 non-EU member state from the Mediterranean region with a total funding volume of around € 1 million are funded.

After positive evaluation full-proposals will be submitted at 21.09.2021. There are differences in funding within the sections. Section 1 is funded according to the criteria of the 8th EU Research Framework Program Horizon 2020, Section 2 is funded by national funding agencies according to the respective national criteria (for Germany the BMBF via the Projektträger Karlsruhe). Applications in Section 2 in particular have a very high funding rate of around 30%.

Overview about sections and topics:

Section 1, Topic 1: Water reuse and water desalination for agricultural and food production (RIA)
Section 1, Topic 2: Improving the sustainability of Mediterranean agro-ecosystems (RIA)
Section 1, Topic 2: Implementing innovation in Mediterranean Agrofood chains by smallholders and SMEs (IA)

Section 2, Topic 1 (RIA):
1.1 Water resource availability and quality within catchments and aquifers.
1.2 Sustainable, integrated water management.
1.3 Irrigation technologies and practice.

Section 2, Topic 2 (RIA):
2.1 Adaptation of agriculture to climate change.
2.2 Preventing emergence of animal and plant pests and diseases.
2.3 Farming Systems able to create employment and territorial development.

Section 2, Topic 3 (RIA):
3.1 Valorising food products from traditional Mediterranean diet.
3.2 Food safety and quality in local food chains
3.3 Health effectts of the dietary shifts and promotion of healthy and sustainable diets for the Med populations.