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Newsletter 01, December2018

A big welcome and Season's Greetings from ProjectManager Judith and Project Coordinator Ulrich. It has

been an exciting start for us, with all deliverablessubmitted on time!

Our research is well under way including, the mappingof contentious inputs and their alternatives, consumerresearch, an ongoing livestock survey and we are also

preparing for next year’s field experiment season.At ICOAS 2018 we held a joint workshop with oursister project RELACS who we continue to work

with on research and dissemination. Thank you for allyour input and support in 2018, Judith and Ulrich.

Organic-PLUS website

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Background to Organic-PLUS

Organic-PLUS is a European Horizon 2020 projectcomprising 25 partner organisations (universities,NGOs and other research institutions) from 9 EUand 3 non-EU countries. Whilst recognising themultiple benefits of certified organic agriculture, weare working to find alternatives to some of thecontentious inputs that are currently permitted,with a view to minimising and phasing out theiruse. The project began in May 2018 and willcontinue until April 2022, during which time we willissue this newsletter every six months to updateyou on our progress, or for news as it happens,see the News page of our website.

Padova kick-off meeting

Organic-PLUS participants getting together at our Padova kick-offmeeting

In June, after many months of working togetherremotely to devise Organic-PLUS, we were finallyable to get together face to face at our 3 day kick-off meeting in Padova, Italy. 45 participants fromour partner organisations and InternationalAdvisory Board came together to put theproject into action, meeting as a group and also insmaller clusters for more specific discussion. Atthe meeting, we made a number of videosto explain our research and the objectives ofOrganic-PLUS; these can be viewed onour YouTube channel.

We were lucky to be in a region which is home toseveral organic producers and our colleaguesfrom the University of Padova organised farmvisits including an organic dairy farm producingParmigiano cheese and a vegan organic winery.Below is a key to those who attended the kick-offmeeting; we will soon have a directory of allOrganic-PLUS participants on our website.

1.Tove Serup, 2.Ralf Pecenka, 3.Gunnar Vittersø, 4.NikolaosKatsoulas, 5.Giulio Grandi, 6.Geetha Neelakantan, 7.Federico

Righi, 8.Sara Burbi, 9.Ben Raskin, 10.Sang Mok Sohn, 11.FrancisRayns, 12.Rafaela Caceres, 13.M. Reza Ardakani, 14MargiLennartson, 15.Claus Grøn Sørensen, 16.Jagdees Pabla,17.Adrian Evans, 18.Ulrich Schmutz, 19.Frank Oudshoorn,

20.Mahesh Chander, 21.Anne-Kristin Løes, 22.Massimo De Marchi,23.Florence Val, 24.Assumpció Antón, 25.Sophie Valleix, 26.DidierAndrivon, 27.Miguel De Cara, 28.Jens Grønbech, Hansen 29.Faye

Brown, 30.Krystyna Malińska, 31.Uygun Aksoy, 32.GabriellaCirvilleri, 33.Laura Didymus (nee Grenville-Briggs), 34.Özge

Çiçekli, 35.Lucas Knebl, 36.Alev Kir, 37.Glòria Colom i Puigbò,38.Martine Dorais, 39.Joana Amador, 40.Malgorzata Kacprzak

Introducing the Organic-PLUS work packages

Organic-PLUS is organised into six work packages(WPs) and many of our partners work in more thanone: the work packages PLANT, LIVESTOCKand SOIL encompass the research and physicaltrials required to assess alternatives to contentiousinputs in these aspects of agriculture. MODEL willevaluate the practical and economicconsequences of phasing out contentious inputsand introducing alternative inputs or practices.IMPACT is concerned with the vital dialoguebetween scientists, farmers, stakeholders and thepublic; we want to share our research with as widean audience as possible by providing multipledissemination activities and feedbackmechanisms. LEAD manages and coordinates theproject, ensuring transparency across and beyondOrganic-PLUS.

WP1, LEADIt has been a busy start for WP1, beginning with

June’s kick-off meeting in Padova, Italy,organised with the support of theLIVESTOCK team who are mostly based in Italy.Project manager, Judith Conroy was recruited andis now fully operational and we have been workingwith our IMPACT colleagues, to set upcommunication tools such as our website, Twitterfeed and YouTube channel which featuresinterviews with all WP leaders and presentationsfrom the experts on our international advisoryboard.

A new UK livestock partner, the OrganicResearch Centre joined the consortium after alengthy amendment process and we made contactwith our sister project, the FIBL led RELACS.We have discussed how the projects can worktogether, particularly in our disseminationactivities, for example, a joint workshop wedelivered at ICOAS 2018 in Eisenstadt, Austria.

WP2, IMPACT

The main goal of WP2 is to aid the dialogue

between scientists, farmers, stakeholders andmembers of the public about contentious inputs inorganic agriculture. To share our researchfindings, we have set up a website containinguseful information about the project’s goals andexpected impacts. We have also created a libraryon Organic e-prints, where we plan to upload theproject’s results and we have a YouTube channel,which showcases short videos by the WP leadsand members of the advisory board. More regularupdates and news can be found on our Twitterfeed, @OrgPLUSresearch.

Preparation has also begun for a comprehensivequestionnaire survey of public concerns andexpectations about organic food. This research isled by our project partners ‘ConsumptionResearch Norway’ (SIFO) and will seek the viewsof 14,000 consumers across France, Germany,Italy, Norway, Poland, Spain and the UK.

WP3, PLANTParticipants of WP3 have been working to map theuse of contentious plant inputs in 10 projectpartners’ countries; this was done in conjunctionwith WP5 which had a similar task for soil inputs.We asked farmers and advisors about theproduction of four main crops: olives, citrus,tomatoes and potatoes, but also included othersignificant organic crops like strawberries andapples.

The results of this initial mapping task are nowinforming further work on the project. For example,some farmers who completed the mapping taskgave interesting information on alternatives theyare using to reduce the need for copper and

mineral oils. These initial findings were discussedat the IFOAM 3rd European Conference onCopper in Plant Protection in Berlin, 15th-16thNovember 2018.

WP4, LIVESTOCKWP4 is reviewing alternatives to the use ofantibiotics, antiparisitics, synthetic vitamins andconventional bedding material in organic livestockfarming. Work began with an overview of organiclivestock research from 1993 to the present day,with a deeper literature review on alternatives toantibiotics and antiparasitics. This revealed that anumber of plant materials have antimicrobialeffects, including: plant-derived compounds, plantby-products (peels, seeds, husk and kernels),essential oils, and plant extracts (EG, oregano[carvacrol], thyme [thymol], clove [eugenol] andgarlic [allicin]). A further review of alternatives tosynthetic vitamins has also begun. Based on thesereviews, products/molecules are being selected fortesting both in the laboratory and on farms, tocharacterise their chemical composition,concentration and effectiveness against healthproblems.

Livestock survey WP4 has also launched a multilingual livestocksurvey to map the extent of the use of contentiousinputs in organic livestock farming across Europe.This includes synthetic vitamins, antibiotics,antiparasitics and bedding materials. Thequestionnaire responses and literature review willhelp us choose which plant products to study interms of their effectiveness against healthproblems and impact on production. The surveywill be available until late February and wewould appreciate it being shared as widely aspossible.

WP5, SOILWork on WP5 began by mapping the use of peat,plastic mulch material and commercial fertilisersacross Europe. Working with WP3, we askedexperienced agricultural advisors aboutcontentious inputs used in the production of anumber of crops, then used this information tocomplete a comprehensive report. Work has alsobegun on tasks relating to phasing out peat, usingagroforestry products to create mulch materialsand field trials of alternative bio-economy

fertilisers.

We have already been able to share some of ourresearch, including a conference presentation atICA2018 (12th International Conference onAgrophysics). As with the other workpackages,we will be uploading our research to Organic E-prints, where the Organic-PLUS project has itsown library.

WP6, MODEL WP6 is working to assess the practical andeconomic consequences of phasing outcontentious inputs and introducing alternativeinputs or changes in practice. We are currentlydesigning user-centric scenarios which build onthe mapping work of the SOIL, PLANT andLIVESTOCK workpackages as well as taking intoaccount expert knowledge.

The environmental assessment of reference cropsand livestock is one method that will be used tocompare potential alternative inputs or practices.This will help identify any gaps in life cycleanalysis methodology when applied to organicproduction systems and, therefore, opportunitiesto improve the methodology. New researcher

Erik Fløjgaard Kristensen has joined the project atAarhus University to advance this work.

Conferences anddissemination

Over the past six months, researchers working onOrganic-PLUS have attended a range of academicand other organic-movement conferences acrossEurope. Some have given presentations about thework of the project, including the preliminaryfindings of our mapping tasks and relatedresearch. For more information, click on thehighlighted links below:

Organic Innovation Days - Brussels, Belgium -Nov 2018

XIII Congress of the Spanish Society ofOrganic Agriculture (SEAE) - Logroño, Spain –Nov 2018

2018 UK Organic Congress - Rugby, UK - Nov2018

3rd European Conference on Copper in Plant

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Protection – Berlin, Germany – Nov 2018

ICOAS 2018, the 6th International Conferenceon Organic Agriculture Sciences – Eisenstadt,Austria - Nov 2018

ICA 2018, the 12th International Conference onAgrophysics – Lublin, Poland - Sept 2018

30th International Horticulture Congress –Istanbul, Turkey – Aug 2018

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