• The objective of this Operational Group is to facilitate access to research, studies, information and results in organic agriculture, urban planning and sustainable food systems in the Community of Madrid.
• To this end, it has created a network of entities interested in cooperation, generation and exchange of research and results.
• The PAUSA Network has developed both a digital platform and a network of organic and agroecological farms for the systematization of data collection.

The PAUSA Operational Group was established specifically to facilitate access to research, studies, information, and results in organic agriculture, urban planning, and sustainable food systems, taking into account the interests and needs of the primary and secondary sectors.

Until its creation, there was no service in the Community of Madrid that provided information on the studies and research being conducted on topics related to food, agroecology, and spatial planning (in urban planning). This lack of common ground duplicates efforts, fails to generate synergies, and prevents research from being carried out practically on farms.

Tools

To achieve this, the PAUSA Operational Group has developed two tools that can bring together research groups in the Community of Madrid dedicated to the following topics:

• Organic and agroecological food production
• Urban planning and land use planning
• Sustainable food systems

On the one hand, they have created the PAUSA Network , comprised of 10 Experimental Farms , which constitute the basic structure for applying the data generated in the joint databases. The farms cover different productive sectors (horticulture, livestock, olive groves, etc.) and different production systems (conversion, certified organic, and agroecological). Participating farms can be found here .

Furthermore, and above all, they have developed the PAUSA PLATFORM , which facilitates geolocalized access to research, studies, and data on organic farming, urban planning, and sustainable food systems: map here . The platform also provides members with a mechanism for jointly generating open and interoperable databases between research entities and agricultural farms.

Operational Groups and Research Projects

Operational Groups are groups of stakeholders from diverse backgrounds—such as farmers, ranchers, foresters, agri-food and forestry industries, public or private R&D and development training and advisory centers, technology centers, or non-profit institutions, among others—who join forces to achieve innovation to solve a problem or seize an opportunity, with a joint, multi-sectoral approach.

The National Rural Network organizes innovation exchanges among them to share their findings and results, so that progress can be shared jointly.