EUFRUIT helps Europe’s fruit sector reap the benefits of research

The EUFRUIT thematic network met in Leuven, Belgium, on November 9 for its first general assembly.

After less than six months of operation, a dedicated knowledge platform has already launched by the project to facilitate access to research and innovation knowledge across Europe for the fruit sector.

EUFRUIT is a multi-layered project under Horizon 2020 to unleash, stimulate and use European research potential for exploiting new opportunities in the fresh produce category.

The EUFRUIT project was launched March 2016 with the objective of facilitating the access to knowledge and at disseminating existing research and innovation potential for the benefit of the fresh fruit sector and consumers.

The network has the ambitious goal of fully exploiting the European research potential for the fruit sector.

EUFRUIT brings together research institutes and organisations representing members of Europe’s fresh fruit sector, including 21 partners from 12 different countries.

In the first six months of activities, the consortium worked on its four core areas for the innovation potential of the European fruit sector.

It included

• a review and an analysis on the latest trends on the performance of new varieties and cultivar developments,
• a review  of initiatives to minimise residues on fruit and in the environment,
• an inventory of improvement of fruit handling and storage and
• the identification of activities enhancing sustainable production systems.

For each of these topics, a review of existing research was conducted and summarised in reports for each of the above areas.

The thematic groups will continue the work in the coming months to broaden the scope of produce covered by the scanning and synthesis reports.

The Annual EUFRUIT meeting took note with satisfaction that after 6 months of operation of the project the Knowledge Platform is fully operational.

Read more about EUFRUIT’s progress here: http://freshfel.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/20161114-EUFRUIT-Annual-Meeting.pdf