Deadline: 15-Mar-22
The Partnership for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean Areas (PRIMA) is now accepting applications for the Agri-food value chain 2022 to focus on topic “Alternative protein sources for the Mediterranean food value chain. From production, extraction, processing and marketing, to societal acceptance”.
Proposals should address all potential sources of alternative proteins such as, but not limited to, traditional alternative protein sources mainly of plants origin (such as legume seeds, cassava or moringa leaves, etc.) and those that fall under the EU “Novel food” (e.g. protein concentrates from oilseeds cakes, fungal mycelia, micro-algae, insects, etc.) and others derived from production processes such as food wastes, agro-industrial by-products or fermented foods by microorganisms.
Food based on microbial fermentation – possibly inspired from traditional fermented Mediterranean foods – could be considered a lever to improve food bio-preservation, nutrition need, food security and acceptability.
Funding Information
Total indicative amount allocated to this call: EUR 8.2 million
Expected Impacts
- Improve consumers’ acceptance of food based on the use of alternative source of proteins
- Reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other negative environmental impacts (e.g. land use, deforestation, biodiversity loss, etc.) due to promoting alternative protein sources.
- Improve human health
- Easier access to cheaper and healthier protein sources as an alternative to animal sources toward healthier and sustainable diets
- Optimised environmentally friendly techniques to produce novel protein-enriched foods.
- Creating new business plans and models for commercialising the new protein sources (for food, feed and other food industrial purposes) to support the competitiveness of Mediterranean SMEs.
Eligibility Criteria
- Legal entities established in the following countries and territories are eligible to receive funding through PRIMA grants:
- The PRIMA Participating States: The following Member States (MS) of the European Union (EU): Croatia, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, Spain, Slovenia. It includes the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCT) linked to these Member States: The following Third Countries associated to Horizon 2020 (AC): Israel, Tunisia, and Turkey.
- The following Third Countries not associated with Horizon 2020 (TC), having concluded international agreements for scientific and technological cooperation setting out the terms and conditions of their participation in PRIMA: Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Morocco.
- These Associated Countries (AC) and Third Countries (TC) are the Mediterranean Partner Countries (MPC).
- In addition, the following entities are eligible to receive funding through PRIMA grants:
- Any legal entity created under the European Union law.
- Any international European interest organisation. For these two types of entities, their place of establishment is not relevant for eligibility for funding.
- Any international organisation (IO)47 OR any legal entity established in countries as PS may be eligible for funding provided that at least one of the following conditions is fulfilled:
- participation is deemed to be essential for carrying out the action;
- such funding is provided under a bilateral scientific and technological agreement or any other arrangement between the Union and the international organisation or, for entities established in a country which is not a Participating State, the country in which the legal entity is established.
For more information, visit https://prima-med.org/submit-your-project/thematic-area-1-agri-food-2022/