The INCREDIBLE thematic network succeeded in creating and animating five international innovation networks (iNets) on non-wood forest products (NWFP): cork, resin, aromatic & medicinal plants, wild nuts & berries, and wild mushrooms & truffles. Each iNet is present in four or five Mediterranean countries, either Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Croatia, Greece and Tunisia, and currently involves between 300 and 500 stakeholders across the whole value chain.
At the beginning of the project, the iNet stakeholders were consulted in a series of five scoping seminars (one per iNet) about the current situation of their sector. As a result, the project developed a narrative on each sector, to have a more complete map of each value chain and, most importantly, to compile a list of priority issues and problems to be solved, some of them sector-specific, others transversal. As expected, stakeholders in other regions already had solutions for most of the issues or could provide good practices or success cases that would foster the innovation required to solve them. In order to allow this exchange, INCREDIBLE organised a series of free events, in different locations, for any interested stakeholder: 45 one-day science to practice events (two of which were international training sessions) for practical knowledge transfer, and 15 (two or three-day long) interregional workshops, combining seminars and debates, field trips and farm-to-farm innovation activities. INCREDIBLE also organised three cross-cutting seminars to address transversal issues: territorial marketing, innovative business models and information and communication technologies applied to NWFP. A policy forum has also been organised to generate policy recommendations, both at the EU and national level, on improved governance on NWFP. Finally, nine entrepreneurs from five start-ups, the winners of the INCREDIBLE Open innovation challenge, have been supported through a ten-day business and social innovation acceleration service to help them improve and commercialise their business.
To record all the relevant information exchanged in these events and to facilitate access to already existing knowledge, the INCREDIBLE thematic network developed the "Knowledge repository for Non-Wood Forest Products" (
https://repository.incredibleforest.net(si apre in una nuova finestra)) which collected 257 factsheets featuring innovations and best practices about NWFP from the Mediterranean basin. Moreover, policy makers have now access to the white paper "Non-wood forest products for people, nature and the green economy. Recommendations for policy priorities in Europe. A white paper based on lessons learned from around the Mediterranean" (
https://doi.org/10.36333/k2a05(si apre in una nuova finestra)) presented in a Policy forum event, to guide them towards regulations more suitable for the development of the NWFP sector. Most of these events were facilitated by a professional innovation facilitator, who supports the iNet members in having a fruitful and more dynamic relationship with the stakeholders.
To achieve all this, the iNet coordinators, co-coordinators and local contact points were in constant communication with the stakeholders. They posted 35 blog articles in INCREDIBLE website, wrote more than 250 articles in other communication channels, sent 13 electronic bulletins, posted 930 tweets that generated 780 followers, and released five motion infographics about NWFP value chains and five videos to present the five start-ups supported by the acceleration service. All these achievements were celebrated in April 2021 in the Final conference, where, in addition, the attendees were invited to vote for their preferred finalist of the Knowledge contest. The winner and two runners-up received a grant to visit the INCREDIBLE consortium member of their choice in order to increase their knowledge and network on NWFP.
