9.3 European Research Supports 2022

European Research Area Networks (ERA-Nets) and Trans-national Calls In 2022 the Department continued to use funding under its competitive research programmes to enable Irish researchers to participate in collaborative international partnerships through selected European Research Area Networks (ERA-Nets), Joint Programme Initiatives (JPIs) and Trans-National Calls. Notable commitments under these initiatives in 2022 included:

€1.5 million was committed by DAFM to the 2nd External Call of EJP Soil on managing and M mapping agricultural soils for enhancing soil functions and services.

€1 million was committed to the 2022 Joint Call on transparent agri-food systems for M consumers and other stakeholders along the food value chain based on ICT technologies.

€500,000 was committed by DAFM to the Joint Programming Initiative - a Healthy Diet M for a Healthy Life (JPI HDHL) 2022 research call to investigate responsiveness between nutrition and the immune system. A similar commitment was made to invest in the JPI HDHL 2023 research call on ‘New food resources and technologies to improve public health and food security’.

€997,096 was awarded to two projects under the Joint FACCE-JPI (Joint Programme M Initiative on Agriculture, Food Security and Climate Change) and SusCrop (Sustainable Crop Production) Agrobiodiversity Research Call.

Horizon Europe Horizon Europe is the EU’s funding programme for research and innovation with a budget of €95.5 billion. It tackles climate change, helps to achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and boosts the EU’s competitiveness and growth.

In Horizon Europe, Cluster 6 focuses on Food, Bioeconomy, Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment. The first signature year for Horizon Europe research calls was 2022. In Cluster 6, Ireland successfully secured over €50m from 83 different research calls. Irish researchers will coordinate 11 projects and collaborate with more than 1,800 other research organisations from around the world in other projects.

Figure from page 280