ABOUT

OBJECTIVES

SCALARE aims to develop a comprehensive innovation ecosystem to advance agroforestry land management systems across the Mediterranean region.

Its main objectives will be achieved through the following specific objectives:

Through a network of living labs, the project will co-assess innovative agroforestry systems together with local and regional stakeholders to ensure they optimize agronomic, environmental, and production outcomes, while remaining both economically viable and socially acceptable.
SCALARE will also co-develop business models grounded in empirical evidence of economic performance, farmers’ willingness to adopt, and consumers’ willingness to pay, placing special emphasis on opportunities offered by markets for ecosystem services.
All project activities will build on existing evidence and expertise and will be complemented by targeted capacity-building actions and expert decision-support tools designed to help practitioners introduce and scale up agroforestry practices effectively.

KEY OUTCOME

The key outcome of SCALARE will be the identification and upscaling of technical economic, and social innovations, grounded in scientific evidence and wide acceptance, as the bedrock for the development and wider adoption of agroforestry in the Mediterranean region.

ACTIVITIES

SCALARE is organized into six interlinked Work Packages (WPs):

WP1: Stakeholder Engagement using Living Labs. WP1 carries out stakeholder-led research through Living Labs, ensuring that acquired knowledge from other work packages is transferred into real-life application. At the same time, the Living Labs provide valuable input for the project's work packages.

WP2: Leveraging Knowledge. WP2 focuses on building existing knowledge and expertise on agroforestry systems and their upscaling, in order to guide the design and implementation of innovative actions and to provide a solid knowledge-base for the other work packages.

WP3: Testing Innovative Agroforestry Systems. WP3 focuses on the establishment and testing new and existing innovative agroforestry systems, while evaluating their biophysical and agronomic performance, biodiversity benefits, and their potential to address critical outcomes. The goal is to generate empirical evidence and identify good practices that support broad implementation of agroforestry innovations.

WP4: Business Model Development. WP4 aims to generate empirical evidence on the economic and behavioral factors influencing the adoption of agroforestry systems. It will provide assessments on the feasibility and the viability of innovative business models for scaling up agro-forestry-related market and non-market products, providing the basis for developing specific business success stories.

WP5: Documentation, Exploitation, and Capacity Building. WP5 focuses on the strategic exploitation, dissemination, and communication of project results. It will design dedicated tools and methods for education and training markets on agroforestry, as well as an expert system to support expert decision-making related to agroforestry.

WP6: Coordination and Management. WP6 is dedicated to the effective coordination and management of the project, ensuring that ethics, data security and gender considerations are fully mainstreamed across all activities.