Together with the Regionalpark RhineMain (RP), the Institute for Rural Structural Research (IfLS) is developing the action plan 'Developing Cultural Landscape. Strengthen agriculture. Experience the Regional Park' as part of the EU-Interreg project CityZen. The plan intends to promote regional agriculture, among other things by developing concrete cooperation projects with added value for the Rhine-Main region.
At the end of March and May, two workshops were held on the topic of 'Cooperation with Agriculture'. The IfLS and the RP initially invited regional actors from the tourism, agricultural and food sectors to exchange ideas and experiences, who will continue to provide advice as a regional stakeholder group in the future. Specifically, the aim was to identify possible synergies between conventional agriculture and the objectives of the RP (e.g. flowering areas along the RP routes), cooperation with alternative agricultural models and projects for the conservation and development of the cultural landscape (with a focus on orchard meadows).
In a second step, members of the Conference of Regionalparks and Green Belts (an informal network of (urban) regions at federal level) discussed how cooperation projects can be realised. The participants noted that there must be a continuous exchange between agriculture and the population as well as between RP and agriculture. This is the only way to build trust, to better (financially) reward social and ecological services in the vicinity of cities and to take into account the individual backgrounds, networks and production methods of farms.
Picture credit: IfLS, Meeting of KORG members
