During November and December 2018, the partners of the ‘Learning Platform’ project surveyed invited land-based organisations with the goal of identifying the needs and assets of access to land initiatives in Europe. We had a fantastic response with 32 organisations across 13 countries completing the survey and providing a rich source of data which we are now busy analyzing.
Divided into four sections, and carefully structured to capture essential information about work and resource needs and priorities, the survey asked organisations to not only identify their priority needs but also to consider what resources could be shared to help others.
Sections on practical aspects asked participants to identify their needs regarding specific access to land topics and the practical implications in fieldwork with agroecological farmers. A learning resources section collected information about the formats of resources on access to land issues used by participants and a section on capacity building asked participants to indicate their needs to build capacity in support of their work both within their organisations and more widely with stakeholders. Importantly, throughout the survey, options were included for prioritising responses both for areas of work and for resources need.
Data interpretation is in progress but initial reading reveals some strong shared priorities across both well-established and those more newly formed organisations. Top priority work areas include farm succession, supporting new entrants and future farmers as well as managing land acquisition and new ownership models.
The survey results will directly inform the production of the learning resources we will now go on to develop which include a peer-to-peer mentorship programme and training events for European land initiatives. The final report presenting the survey results and confirmation of the resulting topics for our programme of work will be available at the end of March.