Eco-Social Farming

<< Background >>When our team applied for the project in 2022, the issue of environmental sustainability was quite vibrant. We had long-term experience with social farming as a specific setting for people with special needs and their involvement in farm settings. The need came from the part of the social work discipline in which the topic of ecology and environmental justice is underestimated and even not well known in project countries (Czechia, Germany, Slovakia). Social work is crucial in reaching social cohesion and aims to empower people to fulfil their lives. Life quality is a balanced social, health, physical and spiritual well-being. In an environmental justice speech, the quality of life is highly influenced by the environment in which we live. It should provide safety, healthy air and food, drinking water, and clean public spaces. People living on the social edge are often limited in their full participation in the societal benefits and lack a voice to advocate for their needs. Social workers should embrace these needs and provide vulnerable people with enough opportunities to influence and co-create the places where they live. The need was to highlight the connection between social work expectations and the offer of social farming. << Objectives >>As written in the project application, we wanted to boost the recognition of social aspects in agriculture and disseminate their importance among farmers. We tried to mainstream the idea of social farming so that more farmers would learn about it and be willing to provide services to people with special needs. We then wanted to recognize how social work can apply environmental aspects through social farming and disseminate them across social work and farming entities. We wanted more vulnerable people to co-create their living environment and recognize the relations between activity and its impact on nature and ecology. We then wanted to prepare the ground and framework for furthering these ideas in Central European countries in a more significant partner consortium of higher education institutions in some future projects to prepare better students for current life challenges. << Implementation >>During our two-year project, we conducted several activities to get and disseminate the newly acquired information among various target groups mentioned in the project application and above. a) On-farm study visits and in-depth discussions with social farmers and social workers are needed to identify their concrete approaches to enhancing social assistance well-being and optimizing their ecological footprint, landscape development, etc. (the inspiration for other organizations). We did all together 3 on-farm study visits in Germany, Slovakia and Czechia and three in-depth focus groups with farmers and social workersb) Development of an indicator matrix of social farms, a document elaborated on literature review, focus groups and observationsc) Round tables in CZ (international group), GE (students and farmers), SK (international group) and online surveys testing these indicators (210 questionnaires, return rate 29 %)d) Short report (Handbook) for learners on locally anchored environmental interventions inthe countryside (social farms for furthering environmental aspects in social work, higher education, and social elements in agriculture)e) three in-person project meetings, multiple emails, online calls, online meetings<< Results >>We have three specific outputs: the Social Farm Indicator Matrix, the Online Survey results and the Handbook of Synergies on Social Farming and Ecological Goals (uploaded in E+PRP) and displayed at our website www.socialni-zemedelstvi.cz. Results include a change in thinking about social farming as a contribution to green social work and environmental justice, both on the part of social farmers, social workers and people with specific needs. Among the results is that we have focused on the public and implementers to be more aware of the social aspects of agriculture thanks to the project. We have shown how agriculture empowers people with disabilities, what concrete farm operations make the environment more sustainable, and what activities make participants more self-confident. We have shown that social farms promote participation and civil society and what tools they use. Through concrete examples, we have demonstrated how people with disabilities can become active on farms and thus become active players in creating a quality environment. This could have been shown by the outputs produced and their dissemination or by using the data collected during the project at international conferences.