Skip to content Skip to footer

FUTURAL Open Call Draws High-Level Interest!

Running from June 28th to September 30th, 2024, the FUTURAL Single Open Call exceeded all expectations, attracting strong interest and numerous innovative applications! Seventy-nine (79) applications from across Europe and beyond, presented innovative ideas, with applicants seeking funding to address rural challenges through their Smart Solutions across FUTURAL’s five thematic domains. Indicative of the immense interest in the FUTURAL Open Call is the total requested budget, which reached 9.15M euros, exceeding the available funding of 1.2M Euros by more than 7.5 times! But what do the statistics reveal about the Open Call applicants? Let’s dive into the numbers and take a closer look!

Sheer Interest across Europe!

The FUTURAL Open Call saw a remarkable total of 79 applications across 23 countries. This diverse representation underscores the widespread appeal of the initiative and the pressing need for Smart Solutions in rural areas. Notably, the top three participating countries were Greece, with 22 submitted proposals, followed by Spain with 12, and Italy with 10.

The breakdown of the partners


As communicated by FUTURAL, small consortia of 2 to 4 partners could claim up to €60,000 each. The applications were required to include at least one technical party (e.g., SMEs, startups, research organisations) and at least one rural community (e.g., municipalities, regional authorities, development agencies, NGOs). The applications data revealed that the average number of partners per application was 2.7 showcasing strong collaboration. Out of the 213 partners involved, 125 were technical parties, while 88 represented rural communities, all aiming to address key local challenges. It should also be noted that the average budget per proposal reached 115,831.20 euros.

Citizen engagement and climate mitigation, the top priorities

Moving on to the five thematic domains, the proposed Smart Solutions need to fall in; the two dominant domains leading the way in submissions were “Citizen Engagement and Quality of Life,” representing 32.9% of the total applications, and “Climate Mitigation & Adaptation” which accounted for 22.78%. Regarding the other domains, the applications were distributed as follows: “Circular Bioeconomy, Biodiversity, and Ecosystem Management” at 17.72%, “Lifelong Education and Training” at 13.92%, and “Resilience to Shocks” at 12.66%.

it_ITIT