European farmers and their successors live in a changing market environment and have to prepare for the new Common Agricultural Policy after 2015, allowing more freedom to produce products of own choice and quantity. The new EU countries experience this even more. Especially the situation in less favored regions, often in remote areas with relative small farms, is complex. Such families are found in large numbers in Central- and Eastern Europe. Then the ability to apply entrepreneurial skills is a key factor for survival. One component of entrepreneurship deals with strategic choices. However, farmers focus on day by day management and operational, rather than strategic decisions. Capacity to take initiative is also a large challenge. The Interactive Strategic Management (ISM) method was introduced in 3 Central-Eastern EU countries within Leonardo da Vinci Transfer of Innovation ISM Project in 2011-13, to instruct dairy farmers and advisors how to prepare a farm strategy. The trainings were very positively evaluated. Also, scientifically based positive effects were measured on competencies’ development of the farmers. Based on these positive experiences we built the current proposal. The sustainability of the developed innovative method would be enhanced by adding more languages and farm sectors. The new concept of “networking” through interaction with professional outsiders would support the development of social competencies and initiative. Marketing know-how for choosing consumer oriented activities and economic calculations should receive more emphasis in the training process. Therefore, the aims of this ISM+ project and linked activities are to: • assess the local framework conditions by a context analysis in order to adapt the ISM method and understand the outcomes of the training process; • extend the ISM method to farmers and students in a variety of agricultural sectors; • make the ISM method more applicable to market oriented development paths; • add a business planning module for economic assessment of farmer choices; • make the training applicable to a larger language area in Europe; • introduce the concept of networking to stimulate social entrepreneurship; • improve competency in entrepreneurship of advisors, teachers, farmers, and agricultural students; • evaluate the effect of the trainings and use of tools; • create an internationally oriented website to disseminate the project methods and results. Innovative marketing and networking methods will be included in the educational package. Countries involved in the ISM+ project are Poland, Slovenia, Lithuania and Austria, representing the small sized farming sectors, which especially need support in entrepreneurship development. The other involved countries are The Netherlands, which plays a role of the method owner and guidance, and a German/French partner that has wide experience with (home) marketing and cooperation, adding this know-how to the consortium. The target groups are agricultural teachers and advisors on one hand and farmers and vocational agricultural students, on the other hand. The “outside professional world” will be interactively involved in networking sessions. The project consortium consists of organizations in the fields of research, education, economics, know-how transfer and agro-business. Participation of the agricultural universities (Wageningen, Ljubljana and Warsaw) and the Economic Institute in Vilnius, on the one hand, and professional farmer associations and extension services in all countries, on the other hand, assure smooth cooperation, innovative knowledge transfer and interaction between science and practice, which contributes to achievement of the project objectives. The positive experiences from cooperation in the previous project add to a solid fundament for this new project. This ISM+ project focuses on product development serving the ERASMUS+ goals. It strengthens the capacity of teachers and extension workers to help articulate and develop strategies and market opportunities. The ISM tool and materials are made applicable to a variety of sectors, the local situation and languages in the four countries, and become part of the extension packages and educational curricula. The project deals with the key action "Cooperation for innovation and exchange of good practices". It supports "Strategic partnerships" and "Knowledge and sector skills alliances", and produces outcomes related to "innovative approaches to address target groups", “use of participatory approaches and ICT-based methodologies”, “improved practices for the needs of disadvantaged groups”, and “increased capacity to work at international level”. It is expected to have a positive impact on “sense of initiative and social entrepreneurship”, “skills for employability and business creation”, and “interaction between practice, research and policy". The project will establish the framework for an EU Entrepreneurship and Strategic Manageme
European agriculture experienced huge changes in last decades. Adaptations to institutional and marketing changes, influenced by EU common agricultural policy, but also by societal wishes like food safety, animal welfare and the environment, require the ability to apply entrepreneurial skills as a key factor for survival. However, strategic thinking is rarely present in the farming sector. Agricultural producers focus on operational decisions taken “by the day” and often do not see the need for a long term vision for their firm. Especially the situation in less favoured regions, often in remote areas with relative small farms, is complex. To build a future in these areas asks for entrepreneurial competencies. The main purpose of the ISM+ project was to spread the idea of strategic thinking in agriculture and introduce innovative tools to support farm advisors and farmers in entrepreneurship and the strategic management process. The target groups of the project were farmers and vocational agricultural students on one hand and agricultural teachers, extension workers and advisors on the other hand. The project is based on the unique method and tool - Interactive Strategic Management (ISM), which was developed in the Netherlands and introduced in (transferred to) other European Countries like Poland, Slovenia, Lithuania and Austria. The method was used in trainings to instruct farmers, advisors and students how to prepare a successful farm strategy. The detailed aims of this ISM+ project were to: • improve entrepreneurial competencies of farmers, advisors, teachers, and agricultural students; • assess the local agricultural framework conditions by a context analysis in order to adapt the ISM method and understand the outcomes of the training process; • extend the ISM method to farmers and students in a variety of agricultural sectors (dairy, beef, pig, crop production); • make the training applicable to a larger language area in Europe (English, German, Polish, Lithuanian and Slovenian languages); • make the ISM method more applicable to market oriented development paths by adding the marketing module; • add a business planning module for economic assessment of farmer choices; • introduce the concept of networking to stimulate social entrepreneurship. The project consortium consisted of organizations in the fields of research, education, economics, know-how transfer and agro-business. Participation of the agricultural universities (Wageningen, Ljubljana and Warsaw) and the Economic Institute in Vilnius, on the one hand, and professional farmer associations (like in Klagenfurt) and extension services in all countries, on the other hand, assured smooth cooperation, innovative knowledge transfer and interaction between science and practice, which contributed to the achievement of the project objectives. The project results form a wide education platform for rural entrepreneurship: • Report from the Context analysis - about the differences in strategic choices of both farmers and stakeholders in different regions of Europe (resulted in two scientific articles and 2 articles in progress to be submitted). • IFMA publication with description of ISM+ tool and other tools all around the world. • Website "Entrepreneurship with Vision", devoted to Interactive Strategic Management for farming – serving as a platform for the project results and materials available to the wide public http://ism.sggw.pl/ • ISM+ tool with complete training materials (ISM+ handbook "Entrepreneurship with Vision", and other materials ) – is dedicated for trainings of farmers, rural entrepreneurs and advisors to work with farm strategy development. • Business planning module – it is an excel tool which helps to analyse the current farm economic situation and simulate future economic consequences for different strategy choices of farmers; • Marketing module – material for training in the area of the marketing strategy of the farm; • Guidelines for Networking methodology – serves as a guideline for trainers and extension workers in supporting networks in the agricultural sector and in implementing the networking concept in ISM trainings; • ISM training module guidelines for agricultural students – serves as curriculum for ISM sessions adjusted to agricultural students; • Book “Tools for improving entrepreneurship and communication for small scale farms” – helps to get insight into the ISM method and modules, including some examples from farms in the participating countries. The project supports the VET system in each of the participating countries and other countries, like Sweden, with the new method of training and training materials, and is also applicable at the level of agricultural professional schools. Farmers and advisors found the ISM method very interesting and innovative. The project has been stimulating and inspiring for all persons involved. We hope that our results will be useful for a wide range of beneficiaries.