On October 27th, the first meeting of the Italian RAIN was held at l’Azienda Pian del Grano di Grotte di Castro, under the responsibility of the IB Marco Lauteri and the supervision of the project representative Pierluigi Paris.
An introduction of the including AF4EU objectives, current and some future expected activities, objectives and results and its connections with the AFINET project was carried out. The next meeting step was to present a talk related to the extension services development, either for the extensionist EUFRAS capacities and the AF educational modules content.
After introducing the advisory services in the region, a survey was carried out to review the current status of agroforestry education and training in Italy, analysing the gaps in extension resources and training needs, identifyng training priorities and means of delivery, with the application of peer-to-peer and on-site knowledge transfer, continuous professional development and appropriate visibility and recognition of the quality and skill levels of agroforestry advisors.
After the meeting and the scheduled programme, an engaging fild trip was organised were the participants continued with the discussion of the main challenges agroforestry faces in the region.
