The #LEADFARM 5.0 project aimed to analyze the opportunities offered by digital innovations in a 5.0 Society, diagnose the future skills and competencies needed in the cooperative agri-food sector, and develop innovative learning methodologies and smart specialization mechanisms targeting cooperatives and young farmers. It also sought to promote scientific dissemination through new forms of accessible learning, ensuring equal opportunities for groups at risk of exclusion, encouraging the participation of women in new emerging jobs and promoting the cooperative culture and values needed in Society 5.0. The project functioned as a network for the development and piloting of a competency framework and training curriculum that will help obtain key skills, knowledge and competencies in ICT and robotic technologies, environment, management and entrepreneurship, and social and emotional intelligence. #LEADFARM 5.0 served as a roadmap for cooperatives to embrace the concept of Society 5.0, focusing on human-centered growth and sustainable development towards 2030.
The project was requested in response to the need to integrate advanced technology, such as Big Data, IoT, AI and robots, into society in order to address urgent social problems, such as population aging and pollution, within the framework of the Japanese initiative Society 5.0. #LEADFARM 5.0 sought to conduct a conceptual and experimental analysis of this trend involving human empowerment supported by technology at the center of productive processes. The aim was to ensure that the agri-food cooperative sector would not be left behind in this technological transition and would remain committed to contemporary problems. This project addressed the need to improve the knowledge, capabilities and skills of European agri-food cooperatives in relation to the use of digital innovations that can easily adapt to the new agricultural models that will largely replace the intensive industrial agriculture model and will require changes in business decision-making processes. It was also raised as a response to the challenges of digitalization and connectivity and the social, territorial and gender gaps highlighted by the Covid pandemic.