Greece

Greece is one of the pilot countries of the FARMWELL project. The core partners in Greece are:

The 1st Practice Group meeting that focused on discussion about social challenges of farmers – took place through two sessions with the participation of 22 stakeholders, including:

• An online session with “Women in Olive Oil Greece” – a female only group working in the olive oil sector, including farmers-producers, agronomists, and distributors on 15 July 2021
• A session with physical participation with the members of STEVIA Hellas Coop-agricultural Cooperative took place on 23 July 2021

Social challenges of farmers identified in Greece are presented in the mapping report

The main challenges that the FARMWELL project will focus on in Greece include:

• Ageing of Farmers
• Farm (rural) Women’s Social integration/identity

The 2nd Practice Group meeting – that focused on presenting and discussing social innovations in response to crucial challenges that impact on farmers’ wellbeing – took place through a face-to-face session on 19-20/03/2022 in Fthiotida, Greece with the participation of 21 stakeholders including farmers’ representatives, social innovation presenters and members of the local energy cooperative currently being established.

The social innovation presented during the 2nd Practice Group meeting in Greece was:

• MYRMIDONES Energy community offering solutions to several challenges (e.g energy poverty) and addressing issues of equal gender opportunities in a rural area. The energy community aims to minimize the costs for current farms and offers opportunities for the creation of new farms and businesses that will keep young people in the area or even attract new entrants to farming by creating sustainable and decent vacancies for the unemployed.

Greece has carried out practical innovations action according to the specific needs of the farmers, allowing experimentation & co-learning. Pilot actions have been based on collaborative & interactive models, with the purpose of creating new linkages and connections between farmers and other stakeholders, building on their capacity for long-term cooperation.

You can read the pilot report here: POWER to the PEOPLE: Energy Communities (EnrgCom) & wellbeing for ALL