Realizing farms of the future as a foundation for bioregional regeneration in Transylvania, Romania
The RVO Idea Accelerator project
The Agricultural department of the Dutch embassy in Bucharest together with the Dutch Enterprise Agency (RVO) collaborated from April 2024 to January 2025 with ALPA on a so called ‘Idea Accelerator project’. The aim of the project was to scale up and accelerate the ALPA model. Key focus elements in the project were the development of a viable business model for an agroecological pilot farm and training center. Wageningen University joined the project with knowledge and exchange from the Farm of the Future project, as well as the dutch agroforestry farm ‘Nieuwe Bodem’.
Context of the project
The region of Transylvania in Romania is renowned for its high biodiversity, making it one of Europe’s ecological treasures. The region boasts a mix of pristine forests, flower rich meadows, karst landscapes, and wetlands. Its varied topography and traditional small scale agricultural practices, including hay meadows and pastures, have created a cultural landscape that provides a haven for numerous plant and animal species, supporting diverse wildflower species and pollinators. This high level of biodiversity is a result of harmonious coexistence between nature and human activity, preserving ecosystems that are now rare across much of Europe. The trends of an aging rural population, a shortage of young farmers following up, and the development of large-scale industrial agriculture have however increased pressure on these biodiverse and unique landscapes.
Traditionally, in Romania small-scale farmers are not only seen as owners or users of agricultural land, but even more so as food suppliers and stewards of natural resources and sociocultural rural values. Romania has almost 3 million so-called family farms, which is over 50% of all small-scale farms in the EU. Due to the above mentioned pressures they, including their important landscape elements, are however disappearing rapidly.
Reasons for the shortage of young farmers are the migration to urban areas, and the lack of financial support. Also, improvements in education and sharing inspiring examples of how to set up and run a financially sustainable farming enterprise using regenerative and agroecological practices are much needed to attract young and aspiring new farmers.
In Transylvania there is the combination of the high number of small-scale farms run by aging owners, the ambition to protect and restore the social and natural characteristics of the bioregion, the importance of agrotourism, and the proximity to various booming urban markets. This context provides an excellent opportunity for a community-based initiative to address the urgent need to attract new and young farmers, by incubating and realizing new viable small-scale farm models based on innovative regenerative farming practices.
The RVO Idea Accelerator assignment: ambitions and objectives
As part of their work-program, the LAN team at the Dutch embassy in Romania aims to increase the knowledge and application of regenerative agricultural practices. The team therefore explores promising viable options for (designs of) such agricultural systems and builds networks to promote and facilitate further uptake in Romania. The exploration of a sustainable business model is a very important key to successfully increase the adoption of regenerative agricultural practices. A key activity is a pilot project centered around the ALPA Land for Life initiative. The ambition of this LAN program pilot is to scale up both the ALPA concept to a pilot farm combined with a training centre, and subsequently its regional application. Also, as a network, ALPA can potentially play an important role in the field of (re)valuation of small-scale agricultural businesses working from agroecological principles and their access to land. Such a network could also contribute to bringing the results of the pilot further, already expand the application and share first insights on viable farms models. Via the Idea Accelerator instrument, financed by the Dutch Ministry of LVVN, RVO GRO was requested to support this work focusing on Transylvanian context, and specifically the role of the ALPA Land for Life initiative, and retrieve relevant insights from Dutch initiatives.
The Idea Accelerator project aimed to address the following questions:
• Which insights can be gathered from relevant examples of Dutch small-scale regenerative agriculture initiatives, relating to their drive, viable business models and market development, knowledge development and exchange, and resource mobilization?
• How can the ALPA concept of regenerative agricultural incubator pilot farm an training centre, land trust and network of viable farm models be further operationalized?
• What funding opportunities would be available for the sustainable (long term) support of pilot farm and training centre concepts and their implementation?
• How can other regenerative farmers/regions/partnerships in Romania (and potentially the Netherlands) also learn from these insights?
Conclusions from the RVO
Regenerative agriculture is gaining momentum in Romania and worldwide among practitioners, scientists and policy makers.
The characteristics of the bioregion subsequently support an important agrotourism sector. Together with a booming urban market, especially in Cluj-Napoca, this provides many opportunities for selling locally produced high quality products from small-scale regenerative farms. As a network broker ALPA also facilitates and promotes the development of broader revenue streams, like organising farms tours and tastings, and linkages with so called “punct gastronomic local”, which connect farm-to-table enterprises with local culinary traditions.
For this, the strategy of ALPA addresses the need to increase the number of small-scale agroecological farms and attract new and young famers. Besides actively participating in scientific research programs (like the H2020 SPADES4Soils program) and international networks on land access and agroecology, their activities concentrate on developing an incubator pilot farm and connected training centre as they recognise the importance of showcasing good examples of how regenerative farming can provide a living for a new generation of young and motivated farmers.
An important challenge for ALPA is to secure funding through grants and/or investors to establish the pilot farm and further develop and scale the ALPA model. Funds are also needed to strategically secure land assets that become vacant. These lands make up essential elements of the bioregional stewardship model that will thrive on a network of future ALPA farms. Using the outcomes of the Idea Accelerator project ALPA can further shape their funding strategy and concretize viable business models.
ALPA takes it further
ALPA wants to especially thank the people who were closely involved in the Idea Accelerator Project; agricultural counselor Sofie Neve and agricultural advisor Anda Popescu at the Dutch embassy in Bucharest , Johan Meijer, Max Zevenbergen and Nicky Kruizinga of the Dutch Enterprise Agency (RVO), Peter Kromann from the Farm of the Future of Wageningen University, and Meta van Drunen and Joep de Roo from the dutch agroforestry farm ‘Nieuwe Bodem’.
The project has given ALPA lot’s of insights, relevant information and connections to further develop the pilot farm and training center concept. The tools and outputs that the RVO team produced support ALPA in the next steps and strategy and in communicating with (new) partners and potential investors and donors.
“We feel greatly supported by the whole team of this project. It has been a wonderful experience to work closely together with the project partners. We see the pilot farm and training center as essential elements to upscale agroecological farming in Transylvania, as they will give the optimal opportunity to young farmers to learn, experiment and optimize their skills and knowledge. The real impact in future sustainable food systems will come from these young motivated and well trained farmers. We are here to support them in making this impact happen.” – Lars Veraart (ALPA founder)
