RURACTIVE Forum – third meeting
The third RURACTIVE Forum, taking place on 23 April 2026 at 13:30 – 15:30 CET online marks a transition towards structured policy formulation. Building on the previous meetings, which took place in February and November 2025, this edition focuses on transforming identified rural challenges into concrete, evidence-informed policy options.
The Forum takes place at a key moment in the European policy cycle, as discussions advance on the post-2027 framework and the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) 2028–2034. RURACTIVE contributes as a science-policy interface and a platform for bottom-up intelligence from the Rural Development Drivers (RDDs) sustainable multimodal mobility, energy transition and climare neutrality, sustainable agri-food systems and ecosystems management, culture and cultural innovation, local services, health and wellbeing, and governance, nature-based and cultural tourism.
The meeting is designed as a hands-on co-creation exercise aimed at:
- Translating rural challenges into structured policy options.
- Identifying systemic barriers affecting rural innovation.
- Generating proto-recommendations aligned with current and upcoming EU policy frameworks.
- Contributing directly to EU and national policy discussions. The session forms a key step toward the development of RURACTIVE’s policy recommendations and guidance.
Participants are invited to follow a structured three-step process in which expert-framed rural challenges are collectively analysed to identify systemic barriers and generate policy options, which are then consolidated into structured proto-recommendations aligned with the current EC policy framework.
The Forum is open to rural practitioners, Rural Development Drivers, EU and national policy actors, thematic experts, and representatives of European networks engaged in community-led rural innovation.
Agenda
| Timing | |
|---|---|
| 13.30–13.45 | Opening RURACTIVE overview and objectives of the Third Forum Claudia de Luca University of Bologna, RURACTIVE project coordinator Policy relevance in the current EU cycle Serafín Pazos-Vidal Senior policy expert, AEIDL |
| 13.45–14.00 | Keynote Rural Pact Framing by Rural Pact Support Office Enrique Nieto Deputy Team Leader (Rural Pact Support Office) |
| 14.00–15.00 | Six parallel roundtables
Pedro Homem de Gouveia Senior Policy Advisor, POLIS network Facilitator: Serafín Pazos-Vidal, AEIDL Culture and cultural innovation Maria João Horta Parreira Universidade NOVA de Lisboa Facilitator: Janne Sinerma, AEIDL Sustainable agrifood system and ecosystem management Prof. Ian Baker University of Birmingham Institute of Forest Research Facilitator: Blanca Casares, AEIDL Energy transition and climate neutrality TBC Facilitator: María Alonso-Roldán, AEIDL Nature-based and cultural tourism Board member of RuralTour European Federation of Rural Tourism Facilitator: Merveille Ntabuhashe, AEIDL Local services, health and wellbeing Prof. Mar Ortega-Reig Universidad Politécnica de Valencia Facilitator: Raquel Pastor Carretero, AEIDL |
| 15.00–15.30 | Plenary
|
If you wish to join the Forum, please register here!