• This is one of the nine living labs established in the framework of the EU-funded project GRASS CEILING which aims to support innovative initiatives led by women in the agricultural sector.
• Coordinated by a team of professors from the Palencia Campus of the University of Valladolid, the living lab is expected to train rural women innovators and set up a network-learning and innovation system.

The University Campus of Palencia (University of Valladolid) was the setting chosen to launch the Spanish Living Lab, one of the nine living labs established in Europe in the framework of GRASS CEILING, an EU-funded project in which CIHEAM Zaragoza participates leading the work package on communication, dissemination and exploitation of results that includes an online training programme.

Spain’s Living Lab launch meeting, which was organised by the academic team of the University of Valladolid and the agrifood cooperative Cooperativas Agro-Alimentarias de España, last 12 June, was attended by eight women farmers from Castilla y León, Aragón, and Asturias, as well as a total of nine external stakeholders related to the project's theme.

The session provided an overview of the project and of the core role of living labs as a space for stakeholders to learn about the specificity of women’s needs around socio-ecological innovation on farms and in rural areas. The session involved interesting discussions about the concept of agricultural innovation, understood as a process of advancement and transformation aimed at generating value in both products and processes, not only at the productive level but also in commercial, organizational, environmental, social, and business and institutional management scales.

Subsequently, the debate focused on analysing the positive and negative factors that currently influence women in adopting leadership roles in the agricultural sector. Furthermore, discussions were held regarding potential actions that would facilitate greater visibility of the work of women farmers and livestock breeders across all spheres.

Participants highlighted the importance of employing participatory methodologies and networking approaches to analyse such a broad and complex reality and how this initiatives can strengthen support networks and exchange perspectives, knowledge, and best practices.

The project, whose objective is to develop a forum where women develop innovations in response to socio-ecological challenges and strengthen the resilience of rural areas, will continue gathering the necessary information to achieve its planned milestones and will hold the next living laboratory meeting in September.