As a follow-up project to the FarmLife I project “Individual life cycle assessment of agricultural businesses in Austria”, the FarmLife II project (currently running until the end of 2017) aims to use the previously developed online tool FarmLife via the Austrian educational and advisory institutions to make agriculture known and to implement it.
The presentation of the contents of the FarmLife tool will be revised over the course of the current project, improved in terms of user-friendliness and expanded with a media collection (videos, scientific literature, links, etc.).
For farmers, taking part in FarmLife means analyzing their own business, providing advice and support with changes in the business process, thereby increasing competitiveness. In external terms, FarmLife means a basis for argumentation for agricultural production methods or proof of a certain product quality.
Furthermore, in cooperation with the University of Agricultural and Environmental Education, educational documents are created that enable a teaching focus on “FarmLife” at agricultural technical schools as well as at higher federal colleges for agriculture. In total, the offer consists of 6 introductory and 6 specific FarmLife modules with corresponding teaching and learning materials as well as work suggestions in which the FarmLife content is prepared didactically. Once completed, these training materials will be available online on the HS learning platform for agricultural and environmental education.
In addition, further training events for users, teachers and advisors as well as ongoing support and advice for multipliers take place in order to support the further development of eco-efficient agriculture and the corresponding raising of awareness.
The overarching project aims to simplify the farm management tool “FarmLife” for the agricultural consultancy and for its use by federal and provincial educational institutions. Improvements affect the utilization as well as the assistance in terms of the contents in consultancy. Complementary work is done concerning an improvement of national input data for the evaluation of environmental impacts. Furthermore, in cooperation with the University College for Agrarian and Environmental Pedagogy an educational package is created holding learning material for 12 modules in total, consisting of presentations, fact sheets and work sheets as well as additional literature.
Additionally, workshops and seminars take place for users on farm level as well as teachers and consultants. Continuous attendance and briefing for disseminators is done in order to support the further development of eco-efficient agriculture as well as appropriate consciousness-raising.
