BACKGROUND INFORMATION

In recent decades important developments have taken place that have transformed the agricultural sector (including fisheries and forestry) as well as the rural areas dramatically. The number of farmers as well as the role of the agricultural sector in the national European economies declined. This process of change continues, although the factors and the intensity of these factors influencing agriculture and the rural areas change and so does the impact. In that perspective, the Standing Committee on Agricultural Research (SCAR) launched a wide foresight process aiming at identifying possible scenarios for European agriculture in a 20-year perspective, to be used in the identification of priority research needs for the medium and long term and in this way supporting the development of a European Knowledge-Based Bio-Economy.

In June 2006 the European Commission established a Foresight Expert Group to gather and analyse foresight information on eight major drivers and to use this information to formulate possible futures scenarios for European agriculture in a 20 year perspective. An initial assessment of the implications for the RTD requirements of European agriculture over the medium to long term was to be carried out on the basis of these scenarios. The reports from the Expert Group were disseminated among relevant stakeholders and discussed, together with other foresight exercises, in a Workshop on "Foresight to Set Long-Term European Agricultural Research Priorities", which was held in Stockholm on 29-30 March 2007 and gathered around 60 participants. The reports of the Foresight Expert Group can be found on the SCAR-website: http://ec.europa.eu/research/agriculture/scar/index_en.cfm?p=3_foresight

The views expressed and the conclusions drawn during this workshop were used, together with other stakeholder consultation as input for the Conference Towards future challenges of Agricultural research in Europe. The overall purpose of the Conference was to identify research needs and develop a coherent European research agenda in order to enable agriculture to cope with a range of complex and interlinked challenges, such as rapidly increasing globalisation, energy shortages, climate change and unsustainable consumption of natural resources. These new challenges require a good understanding of the triggers of future changes, the inter-relationship between such triggers and their potential impact on European agriculture in order for the European agricultural sector to remain competitive worldwide and to overcome emerging threats.