EuroDairy

An international network to increase the economic, social and environmental sustainability of dairy farming.

The purpose of the EuroDairy network is to improve the viability and sustainability of milk production in Europe.

Funded by the EU Horizon 2020 programme, EuroDairy supports the development and communication of practice-based innovation in dairy farming.

It focuses on four key issues:

• Animal care
• Socio-economic resilience
• Resource efficiency
• The integration of milk production with biodiversity objectives

The project adopts the interactive approach of the European Innovation Partnership, putting farmers at the centre of practice-based innovation, adapting and developing new and existing scientific knowledge to produce implementable solutions, which can then be shared across the network.

Twenty partners spanning 14 countries, from Ireland to Poland and from Sweden to Italy, brought EuroDairy to life via a total of 120 innovative pilot farmers participating in the network.

At the heart of the EuroDairy network were 120 innovating pilot dairy farmers from across Europe who demonstrated best practice and pushed boundaries in the application of new innovations within four EuroDairy themes.

The network farmer-driven "operational groups" came together to target specific problems or cross-border opportunities for the dairy sector.

EuroDairy follows on from Dairyman, and is funded by EU Horizon 2020. More information on the programme is available here and further information on EIP-Agri is available here. 

• Accelerate the uptake of best practice by exchanging knowledge on four priority themes (resource efficiency, biodiversity, animal care and socio-economic resilience)
• Capture and/or stimulate more innovative practice in order to provide solutions, or overcome barriers to implementation
• Summarise the scientific and practical-based knowledge created into user-friendly formats and training materials. Disseminate this information widely to European dairy farmers
• Collate ideas from end-users for further innovation-driven research, and communicate these back to the EIP-AGRI network

This project has received funding from the European Union`s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 696364.