Climate change, water and resource scarcity, soil degradation, loss of biodiversity, but also population growth and food waste are putting the current food system under severe pressure across Europe. Sustainable food and nutrition security is therefore one of the major challenges of the future.

In order to make the food system in Europe more sustainable by 2050, the ‘European partnership for a sustainable Future of Food Systems – FutureFoodS’ was launched in June of this year. The EU-wide partnership aims to establish an environmentally friendly, socially responsible and fair, but also economically viable, healthy and safe food system. The initiative brings together 86 national and regional decision-makers, funding organisations and research institutions from 29 countries. The FutureFoodS partnership is one of several co-financed partnerships in the EU Commission's ‘Horizon Europe’ research programme.

The Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food (BMEL) are also involved in the partnership. In order to drive forward the transformation of the food and nutrition system, the BMBF has now launched the funding guideline ‘FutureFoodS Call 2024: Transformation of food systems - reshaping interactions, driving innovation and strengthening sustainable diets’. By funding collaborative research and development projects involving foreign partners, the BMBF aims to strengthen the implementation of the National Bioeconomy Strategy in an international context.

Accelerating the transformation of food systems

The funding programme focuses on collaborative projects with European partners that accelerate the transformation towards more sustainable food production and nutrition and thus create resilient European and global food systems. In addition, the projects must offer a European perspective and focus on topics that are relevant for at least three project partners. The focus is on issues relating to post-harvest aspects.

Innovative business models and food

The following key topics will be funded:

• The path to sustainable and resilient food systems: This includes, for example, the reorganisation of market-based processes, business models, political measures and experimental approaches to solutions. Projects that are funded within the framework of this topic should focus in particular on cooperation and networking between players in the food system.
• New foods – promoting innovations in food design, processing and supply by changing sustainable supply and demand patterns: The aim here is to develop systemic approaches for the design, processing and provision of new types of food based on various raw material sources - such as pulses, cereals, nuts and seeds, but also algae and edible mushrooms as well as foods produced on a cell culture basis or using microorganisms.

Transnational collaborative projects funded

Funding is available for transnational collaborative projects with at least three of the partner countries involved in the call. The project objectives must be realisable within 24 to a maximum of 36 months. Universities, non-university research institutions, state and federal institutions with research tasks and commercial enterprises, in particular small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), are eligible to apply.
The duration of the projects to be funded is generally up to three years. The maximum funding amount per joint project is 350,000 euros.