About

VALOR will adopt a systems-based approach to understanding the importance of pollinators through a series of in-depth case studies in several focal regions across 7 European countries:

Bulgaria

1 Güímar Valley, Tenerife

Partner: University of La Laguna (ULL)

The Güímar Valley is a sparsely populated, highly agrarian area of Tenerife where most people are employed in smallholder tropical fruit farming. The region produces several high value, highly pollinator-dependent crops, most notably avocado, which has expanded considerably in recent years, mangos and pitaya for global fruit markets, and moringa and aloe for medicinal markets. Besides agriculture, the valley includes rare mediterranean scrub, as well as laurel forests and there are two Natura 2000 sites: Malpaís de Güímar (ES7020048) and Corona Forestal (ES7020054), as well as a regional protected area: Siete Lomas, which support numerous endemic plants and pollinators, including several endangered species, and vertebrate pollinators such as birds and reptiles.

Key challenge: VALOR will work with local farmers in the Coplaca cooperative and Canary Islands Avocado Growers Association (Asguacan) and Natura2000 site managers, building upon existing collaborations in the FRUTTMAC and POLINISLA projects, to address concerns about the long term resilience of farming to potential pollinator shifts, and the impact of competition for pollinators on wider biodiversity.

2 Guadalquivir Productive Plains, Spain

Partner: The Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)

The Guadalquivir productive plains are a diverse landscape, mixing protected habitats such as hyperdiverse Mediterranean shrublands and endangered dunar systems (including the Doñana National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site ref: 685bis) with conventional intensive production of berries (blueberry, strawberry), orange groves and olive orchards. These areas both depend on diverse and dynamic pollinator communities, including little-studied beetle floral visitors, which may be sensitive to disruption by activities elsewhere. This need to balance the protection of pristine habitats, holding >300 bee species (including two species that are newly described from specimens in the area), and an intensive productive system immersed in a global trade of fruits makes this area an ideal scenario to evaluate the dependencies of pollinators from local to global scales.

Key challenge: The team has extensive experience working in the natural areas of Doñana Natural Park, and has recently started to collaborate with local farmers to explore the effects of the managed bumblebee pollinators that are increasingly used in the area. This has led to concerns that these managed pollinators, which farmers feel are important to supporting productivity, may result in a distortion of plant-pollinator networks and the spreading of disease to local wild bees. Responding to the needs of these stakeholders, VALOR will bridge these existing collaborations to better understand the optimal balance and long-term impacts of managed pollinators

3 Baden-Württemberg Living Lab, Germany

Partner: Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (ALU-FR)

The Baden-Württemberg Living Lab is a community of 20 established (22 being established) demonstration farms, supported by the Ministry of Agriculture in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. These farms span a range of pasture, arable and perennial crops, including high-value crops such as apples, sunflowers, soy, and pumpkin, and include farms in the Bodanrück Natura2000 area (FFH 8220-341). The Living Lab facilitates and studies the implementation of co-developed ecological farming measures to engage citizen science and develop toolkits.

Key challenge: The EU-project RestPoll, led by ALU-FR, is working with farmers in this living lab who have the most promising restoration measures for pollinators to assess the success of co-designed measures. A key practice among these farmers is the reduction of pesticides, including glyphosates, which is expected to have positive impacts on pollinators and pollination services. VALOR will expand this collaboration to explore the impact that these measures, combined with other practices, have on farm business performance (including opportunities for engaging with alternative markets) and the resilience of plant-pollinator networks to other pressures.

4 Southern Małopolska Upland & the Vistula River Valley Living Lab, Poland

Partner: Jagiellonian University (UJ)

Kraków is the capital of the Lesser Poland Voivodeship and the second largest city in Poland. The Voivodeship is the centre of Polish beekeeping, with as many as 13 colonies/km2. The city is located at the intersection of three major geographic regions and spans much of the Vistula River Valley and is home to three N2000 areas. Among them, the Dębnicko-Tyniecki meadow complex (PLH120065) is the largest and most ecologically diverse area with wetlands and xerothermic grasslands, neighbouring the scientific-industrial complex of the Jagiellonian University’s Campus with a Living Lab on its grounds and the Ruczaj Business Park. North of the city is the Lesser Poland Upland, which has significant agricultural activity, covering 60% of the area and is vitally important to local society and economy. The region has a mix of arable and horticultural production, often on small farms (average size of 3.8ha), including high-value fruits such as apples and cherries, and oilseeds.

Key challenge: Recent studies revealed diverse bee communities both inside the city limits and on the Upland. However, there are concerns about the impacts that agricultural practices and beehive density may have on the stability of pollination services within these ecosystems, and in turn, how different management between urban and rural areas may affect resources for beekeeping. VALOR will work with the UJ campus living lab, growers associated with Maspex (a member of the steering committee), and local beekeepers to build an understanding of these dynamics across these two sites.

5 South-Limburg, Geuldal Valley Living Lab, Netherlands

Partner: Wageningen University (WU)

South-Limburg is a densely populated area in the extreme south of the Netherlands. Intensive agriculture makes up approximately 60% of the land-use, the remaining area split between built-up areas and nature, while tourism represents the main pillar of the regional economy. Agriculture consists of a combination of arable farming, dairy farming and horticulture (pear, apple, cherry, etc.). The area contains a relatively high proportion of Natura 2000 areas with threatened habitat types such as calcareous grasslands (H6210) and Oak-Hornbeam forests (H9160).

Key challenge: Stakeholders in the area want to reconcile intensive farming practices with the maintenance of nearby nutrient-poor habitat types. VALOR will build upon the Living Lab Boshommellandschap Geuldal that targets wild bee conservation at the landscape level and the farmer network that has been built around it within the H2020 SHOWCASE project on integrating biodiversity in farming systems.

6 Kent Apple Orchard Living Lab, UK

Partner: The University Of Reading (UREAD)

Kent is the main fruit-producing area of the United Kingdom, producing most of the UK's apples, plums and pears in small but intensive orchards, mostly for domestic markets. There is little unaltered habitat, but hedgerows and other small linear habitat features are common, which provide undisturbed soil and diverse plant communities to support diverse ground-nesting solitary and eusocial bees. Previous research demonstrated significant deficits in yield and quality, driven by inadequate pollination. This prompted a community of stakeholders, including growers, conservation groups (Wildlife Trusts), marketing boards (Avalon), processors (Innocent drinks) and retailers (Waitrose) to collaborate on wild pollinator restoration in orchards in a Living Lab.

Key challenge: Stakeholders are interested in understanding the potential long-term effects of these interventions on pollination service security and wider value chains. VALOR will engage with these stakeholders, many of whom are long-term collaborators, through their Living Lab (also engaged in the RestPoll project) activities.

7 South Scania, Sweden

Partner: Lund University (ULUND)

The county of Scania in southern Sweden is dominated by agriculture, containing landscapes that range from intensively farmed, simplified arable landscapes dominated by cereals to heterogeneous landscapes with mixed farming including animal husbandry. The county provides habitat for 75% of Swedish wild bee species, out of which 20% are threatened. Scania contains a range of pollinated crops, where crop market value are highest for oilseed rape, apples and strawberries, but field beans is an emerging crop. Previous research has identified trait-related dependencies of pollinator communities on landscape simplification and pesticide use.

Key challenges: Two ongoing, large-scale projects (RestPoll and PollinERA), focus on the restoration of sandsteppe habitats for threatened bees as well as benefiting pollinators in the wider agricultural landscape through creating a series of targeted flower strips, coordinated by the rural extension service, and reducing or mitigating pollinator pesticide risk. VALOR will address the interests of stakeholders (inc. the Swedish Board of Agriculture & Rural Economy and the Agricultural Society in Scania), in the interactions between these two efforts on plant-pollinator network resilience, crop pollination services and social goods from the landscape.

Regional attributes

Each of VALOR’s focal regions has a key challenge identified through consultations with local stakeholders with whom the project team is engaged as part of other multi-actor research projects (RestPoll, Showcase, Safeguard, WildPosh, PollinERA, FRUTTMAC) or through specific dialogues in preparation for this project. Our systems-based approach is designed to explore these challenges within a unified framework while also expanding upon them, evolving these challenges in collaboration with the focal region stakeholders as the project progresses.

Focal Region	1	2	3	4	5	6	7
Rare/threatened
Beekeeping
Othe pollinators
Natura2000
Intensive farming
Smallholders
Urban areas
Fruit crops
Energy crops
Medicinal crops
Fodder crops
Living Lab