Organic agriculture and food markets have grown considerably and organic agriculture addresses important challenges of European agriculture, such as sustainable production of high quality food, reducing dependency on high energy inputs, improving environmental and nature conservation, climate change adaptation, animal welfare and rural livelihoods.

Great potential for innovation
Organic farming and food systems still have a big potential for innovation and improved solutions. Research activities will be important for this. Coordinated transnational research has the potential to create a less fragmented research area in this fast growing sector.

CORE Organic II builds on experience
The European transnational research cooperation project, the ERA-net named CORE Organic II, consists of a network of 26 partners from 21 European countries. The ERA-net started in March 2010 and ran for three years. CORE Organic II was built on the outcome of the first CORE Organic to aim at an effective and sustainable transnational research programme.

Going beyond the ERA-NET
CORE Organic II developed all components to continue the transnational research activities beyond the ERA-NET. The results of CORE Organic II have been a strong and sustainable network of funding bodies, all components for the effective continuation of collaboration, a series of on-going research projects and a support of dissemination.

Many expected benefits of CORE Organic II
The benefits for Europe have been to reinforce its leading status and excellence in organic research, enhancing the European research area on organic agriculture, increasing the efficiency in use of organic research funds and improving the impact of research on the organic sector's development.

Initiating projects on topics identified as common priorities has allowed the sector to better meet the demand for organic food and products. It has contributed to sustainable development in food production and contributed to an improvement in the general competitivity of the European agriculture.