ERMANNO COMEGNA

comegnaIn the last decades Italian and European Agriculture lived a period of deficit in terms of growth of productivity and efficiency. It was moreĀ  to look for public aid (until recently those of Pac and more recently the chapter of renewable energy), regardless of market orientation and innovation. To be fair though, this is the result of a real lack of opportunity to make income from ordinary farming. There are no alternatives, such as to render useless the “search contributionā€. In the past agriculture has experienced a period of extraordinary technical improvements and a succession of innovations that have materially improved the companies’ production. The European Union has become aware of this troubling phenomenon with an initiative on which we are discussing in Italy: the launch of the European Partnership for innovation in agriculture. On one hand it provides a number of resources considerably higher than had been insured in the past, and secondly proposes a new and original way to revitalize the system of knowledge in agriculture and to encourage innovation.

The buzzwords that have been minted by the Commission in its communication of 29 February 2012 are productivity and sustainability. Innovation should therefore be targeted to stimulate greater efficiency and competitiveness of the agri European, but make sure it does not happen at the expense of environmental resources and neglecting the needs of combat climate change, biodiversity decline and neglect the landscape. In each Member State will have to be designed a new system for organizing research, to disseminate knowledge and to foster innovation.

It’s necessary to establish “operational groups”, in the territory who will have to work fast so that there is a generation of processes, products and innovative services. The operation of “operational groups” will be governed at European and national levels through strategic plans, while the rural development programs for the seven years 2014-2020 will give funds for the conduct of financial activities and projects.

There’s a new paradigm which needs to be interpreted by the different subjects and by the institutions, organizations representing economic operators and by the same individual entrepreneurs, who can play an important role in the activities of “operational groups”. It’s not just a matter of using the public funding from the European Union. The real challenge is to implement an original, creative new system of common knowledge for the Ue state members who share the same needs in terms of innovation in the agribusiness system.

Ermanno Comegna