The third workshop of the Evrytanian RAIN was held on 12th of June 2024, organized by the Agricultural University of Athens (AUA) team, led by Anastasia Pantera.
The meeting took place at the facilities of livestock farms, at Stenoma village, 20 kilometers from Karpenisi. The event started with a field visit to silvopastoral systems. The research team of the AF4EU project carried out fieldwork in the mountain pastures of the fir belt, recording the flocks as they returned to their stalls and watering troughs and interviewing local farmers.
The workshop hosted at the Stenoma Primary School, was attended by farmers, researchers, the village’s priest, the Presidents of the local communities, residents and local government officials. The President of the Department of Forestry, Professor Andreas Papadopoulos, welcomed the participants and described the objectives of the project and the long-standing activity of the Department in the direction of linking research projects with local communities. More details about the AF4EU project were reported by the Scientific Officer of the project Professor Anastasia Pantera, then Mr. Konstantinos Mantzanas, on behalf of the Laboratory of Pasture Science of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, presented the necessity of drawing up Grazing Management Plans and special studies for the improvement and management of the mountain pastures of the region, as they are a basic requirement for the support and sustainability of the livestock farming profession in practice.
In the following session, the main topics were the AF4EU Knowledge Platform and Agroforestry Business Models. A practical exercise was conducted in order to detect flaws on a range of selected value chains in Evrytania region. Later on, there was a presentation of the first design of the AFI-BUS DSS, encouraging participants to comment on whether they found the tool useful and possible improvements. The last session presented the different dissemination materials, widely received among the participants. Ten proposed titles were presented for Practice Abstracts and the participants expressed the desire to contribute to whichever of the proposed dissemination material titles expressed their practices. The workshop was rounded off with a Group Discussion on the business model of livestock farming suitable for this particular mountainous region.
