On 9-10 September 2025, Brussels hosted the AGRI4POL stakeholder workshop on pollinator-friendly farming towards a sustainable future of agriculture. The two-day event gathered more than 36 participants from across Europe - including policymakers, NGO representatives, agribusiness and farmer organisations, researchers and agricultural advisors to co-develop strategies that balance the co-benefits and trade-offs of pollinator-friendly farming.
The workshop opened with one of the organisers, Henning Nottebrock (University of Freiburg), introducing the aims and approach, followed by an ice-breaker led by a professional facilitator, Estelle Balian, to set a collaborative tone. Adam Vanbergen (INRAE), AGRI4POL project coordinator, then presented the project’s vision and progress, sparking an interactive discussion. Participants engaged in group work exploring pollinator-friendly practices, innovations and new crops, and heard a presentation from Tereza Prášilová (CzechGlobe) outlining AGRI4POL’s proposed co-benefits and trade-offs framework.
In one of the core sessions, participants worked together to refine the co-benefits and trade-offs framework, which currently serves as a tool for exploring the influence of pollinator-friendly farming solutions on the ecological, agronomic, economic and social dimensions. Their input provides a more complete picture of the range of impacts these measures may have. AGRI4POL will build on this improved framework in the next step of the project: a series of local multi-actor focus groups in five European countries during winter–spring 2026, where these issues will be discussed with stakeholders at the sub-national level.
The final discussions examined the challenges and barriers to implementing pollinator-friendly interventions, culminating in an interactive fishbowl session that highlighted key priorities for action heard from stakeholders and researchers' sides.
The insights gathered in Brussels will directly inform AGRI4POL’s ongoing work to deliver evidence-based recommendations, supporting pollinator-friendly farming.
The photos from the event are available in the AGRI4POL's online gallery.
