Horizon Europe - EU Mission- A Soil Deal for Europe

A Soil Deal for Europe: Supporting the implementation of the Mission Soil As part of the vision to achieve healthy soils by 2050, outlined in the EU Soil Strategy for 2030, the European Commission made a proposal for a Directive on Soil Monitoring and Resilience297, with the Mission ‘A Soil Deal for Europe’ (Mission Soil) as a key instrument for implementation. Moreover, the Vision for Agriculture and Food recognises the Mission and its main target of establishing 100 living labs and lighthouses as an unprecedented resource to support farmers to improve their soils in a challenging geopolitical and environmental context. The Work Programme 2026–2027 builds on previous projects, actions and results, introducing specific actions to engage more and new actors across value chains, achieve more advanced and closer-to-market solutions, and address some remaining knowledge gaps. This Work Programme aims to: • accelerate the development, deployment and adoption of cutting-edge technologies and practices to restore and protect soil health; • foster collaboration between research institutions, land managers, industry, advisors, SMEs, consumers, and other stakeholders, and with other EU initiatives, to drive innovation and knowledge transfer; • strengthen the Mission’s business dimension by supporting the deployment of economically viable models and sustainable value chains on the ground; • explore the interlinkages between human and soil health, helping to fill key knowledge and policy gaps and contributing to a more integrated One Health approach. Applicants should align their proposals with one or more of the key strategic orientations and long term expected impacts of the Strategic Plan of Horizon Europe and the EU Mission's goal of delivering concrete solutions to identified challenges by 2030, specifically contributing to the Mission’s objectives. To further diversify the portfolio of actions and the stakeholders involved, and the impact of its actions, projects are encouraged to build synergies with other initiatives, programmes and organisations—at EU, national, and international level—ensuring coherence and mutual reinforcement of efforts in support of EU policy priorities and the Mission’s objectives. This Work Programme proposes numerous opportunities in this regard. Joint calls with other EU Missions (Cancer and Adaptation to Climate Change) or the New European Bauhaus298 explore connections between soil health and human health, how to build resilience to extreme weather events or how to reduce soil sealing, respectively. A topic on agroforestry promotes connections and synergies with the Agroecology Partnership. The Mission also supports an EIC Accelerator Challenge in the field of biotechnologies for soil health. For this purpose, the Mission will contribute EUR 12 million to the European Innovation Council bringing the total budget for the accelerator challenge to EUR 50 million. Other strategic collaborations (UNESCO, EIT Food) are supported to leverage capabilities and resources that complement the Mission in strategic areas such as the international dimension or technological entrepreneurship for soil health. Participation by private sector actors, including land managers and industry, funders and finance providers, including philanthropic organizations, is also encouraged in all proposed calls and topics to ensure that the Mission helps catalyse greater resource mobilization and broader systemic impact. Successful proposals should prioritise collaboration, data sharing, and synergies with ongoing Mission projects such as SoilWise and with the Mission Soil Platform. Projects are also encouraged to liaise with the Mission Secretariat and contribute to the European Soil Observatory (EUSO), hosted by the Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC). To ensure effective EU-wide communication in all areas related to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) specific results and knowledge (in particular regarding agriculture, forestry and rural development) produced under the Mission Soil must be summarised in an appropriate number of ‘practice abstracts’ in the common EIP-AGRI format. Where applicable, involvement of interactive innovation groups, such as EIP-AGRI Operational Groups, is highly recommended. For areas outside the remit of the EU CAP Network and CAP specific objectives, other similar solutions for dissemination and engagement with innovation groups at the EU level should be sought. Specific requirements for multi-actor projects: The multi-actor approach, which is a form of responsible research and innovation, is designed to enhance the reliability, relevance, and societal impact of research results of relevant projects. A multi-actor project ensures the genuine and sufficient involvement of a targeted and diverse range of stakeholders, such as for example but not limited to researchers, farmers, foresters and representatives of their professional associations, advisors, land managers and owners, spatial planners, food and bioeconomy businesses, consumer associations, local communities, educators, cultural and creative industries, citizens, civil society organizations including NGOs, and government representatives. The selection of key stakeholders depends on the project’s objectives. Sufficient engagement of end-users throughout the entire project lifecycle—from inception and planning through to implementation, dissemination, and potential exploitation of results—promoting co-creation between scientific and practical expertise. This approach contributes to accelerating the acceptance and adoption of new ideas, solutions, and innovations. Proposals submitted for topics requiring application of the multi-actor approach should describe: • how the proposed objectives and planned activities specifically address the needs, problems, challenges and opportunities of the (end-)users how the proposed approaches, particularly the composition of the consortium reflect a balanced choice of relevant key actors with complementary expertise (scientific, practical, etc.) ensure the delivery of results ready for practice; • how existing practices and tacit knowledge will be included. This should be illustrated in the proposals with a sufficient number of high-quality knowledge exchange activities indicating the precise and active roles of the different non-scientific actors in the work. The cross-fertilisation of skills, competencies and ideas between actors should generate innovative findings and solutions that are more likely to be applied on a broad scale; • how the multi-actor engagement process will be facilitated by making use of the most appropriate methods and expertise; • how practical and ready to use knowledge, approaches, tools or products, that are easily understandable and freely accessible, will be developed; • how results and outputs ready for practice will feed into the existing dissemination channels most consulted by (end-)users across countries and regions.