The REGIONS 4FOOD Action Plan in South Ostrobothnia, Finland, combines important regional aspects of the digitalisation of agri-food sector in the form of EAFRD and ERDF projects. The impacts of the actions are already visible as the projects are proceeding. There are concrete outcomes and future plans raising from the actions, and the regional impact will be growing in addition to the already achieved outcomes and cooperation.
In this context, it is worth noting:
- The participatory process of the regional food sector strategy Food Province 2030 that has gained interest in SMEs and stakeholders.
- Big steps have been taken in developing the Food Technology Knowledge and Competence Centre.
- The farmers and companies have found the activities of DigiFarmi educational project worth their time and effort.
- The discussion and cooperation of the network for the Data-Cooperative for farmers is proceeding.
- The PAJATSO project’s activities for reducing surplus food in public kitchens are proceeding.
The implementation of the Action Plan in South Ostrobothnia, Finland, has continued from a good stage. Thus, 4 out of 5 projects of the Action Plan are running with project funding from the policy instruments targeted, and this way achieving the policy influencing as planned. The funded projects are: Food Technology Knowledge and Competence Centre; Food Province 2030; DigiFarmi-project: Education for farmers in digitalisation and new technologies; Combining data to reduce surplus food: PAJATSO; Establishing Regional Data-Cooperative for farmers, is progressing with modifications to larger scale. It has proceeded to a national EAFRD project application, that is pending.
The visibility of the projects strengthens the message sent in a regional scale, that these themes are important and emphasized in regional funding from the policy instruments. Also, both policy instruments have been updated and published, both with several significant key points that have been disseminated during the REGIONS 4FOOD project and during the participatory updating process.
