Six projects led by UB School of Economics researchers have been awarded funding by the Horizon Europe programme for research and innovation

Six teams composed of members of the UB School of Economics lead six different ‘Horizon Europe’ projects, a key EU funding programme for research and innovation,

Federico Demaria, whose research fields are Political Ecology and Ecological Economics, leads at the University of Barcelona the project titled “Towards a sustainable wellbeing economy: integrated policies and transformative indicators (ToBe)”, working together with our researchers Ana Moragues Faus, Mònica Serrano and Enric Tello.

The aim of the project ToBe is to build an understanding of a sustainable wellbeing economy by developing integrated policies and transformative indicators. ToBe will contribute to theoretical and empirical knowledge in the field of sustainability transformation and advance understanding of sustainable wellbeing and inclusive economy beyond the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Together with researchers, policymakers, and citizens in Europe, Africa, and South America, it will study how mindsets, indicators, innovations, and policies could better work together toward the sustainability paradigm.

The results will help create a sustainable and inclusive economy, as well as a shared vision for EU-Africa relations that build on sustainability. It will strengthen epistemic communities to drive carbon-neutrality and tackle inequality and vulnerability in the context of entangled crises by a better understanding of trade-offs and synergies between economic growth and a sustainable wellbeing economy, including logics of change across different dimensions of sustainable development such as the proposal of degrowth.

Our researcher Daniel Montolio, expert in Public Economics, leads another Horizon Europe project titled “Education for Responsible Democratic Citizenship (DEMOCRAT)”, working together with our researchers Guillem Riambau, Jenifer Ruiz-Valenzuela, and Judit Vall-Castelló.

EU-society nowadays faces four major challenges: the Anthropocene crisis, the digitalisation, the pandemic and the Ukraine war and its consequences. Education, and especially Education for Democracy (EfD), shall contribute to the defence and enhancement of democracy. To reinforce the resilience and sustainability of democracy, DEMOCRAT aims to provide insights into the points of comparison and contrast in EfD in the EU-member states, and will develop an innovative curriculum framework linking responsible democratic citizenship with digitalisation and sustainability.

DEMOCRAT will test and analyse pedagogical practices and material considering its effectiveness for acquiring democratic competences and European identity. It will garner insights into the factors influencing the impact of EfD on public participation through the analysis of European data-sets, with a particular focus on the relation between socio-economic and educational inequalities and political and social participation.

Ana Moragues Faus, expert in sustainable food systems and urban food, leads the University of Barcelona team of the project titled “CULTIVATE: co-designing food sharing innovation for resilience”. Working together with Federico Demaria, and Enric Tello, CULTIVATE wants to build a ground-breaking online social innovation support platform: The Food Sharing Compass.

Built with and for five key stakeholder groups –food sharing initiatives, policy makers, food supply actors, researchers and citizens– the platform will enable to navigate diverse food sharing landscapes and cultures, in order to understand, develop, replicate, expand and strengthen sustainable food sharing in Europe. In essence, CULTIVATE will establish the EU as the global frontrunner in the development of resilient and inclusive food sharing economies.

Ció Patxot, an expert in Labour & Demographic Economics, and Public Economics, leads the project titled “Sustainable Welfare: Rethinking the roles of Family, Market and State (SUSTAINWELL)”, to address the long-term socio-economic impact of population ageing on European society. She will work together with our researchers Gemma Abío, Carles Boix, Luiz Brotherhood, Alessandro de Chiara, Alfonso Herranz, Vahagn Jerbashian, Ester Manna, and Alexandrina Stoyanova.

SUSTAINWELL aims to identify opportunities arising from longer and healthy life expectancy; resilient responses from individuals, households, and from other actors in a society facing the challenges posed by ageing; the impact of ageing on inequality; and gender and lifecycle balanced policies helping the sandwich-generation to sustain baby-boomers entering retirement, without decreasing fertility nor investment in education. Particular attention will be devoted to the role of job design to foster intergenerational complementarities in the labour market.

SUSTAINWELL will take a new multidisciplinary approach in different basic (Neuroscience) and social sciences (Economics, Demographics, Sociology and Political Science), and the results will be pursued in permanent contact with stakeholders, to deliver knowledge and evidence-based policy measures by applying a participatory design and co-creation activities.

Vicente Royuela leads the project titled “Twin transition and changing patterns of spatial mobility: a regional approach (MOBI-TWIN)”, working together with our researchers Jordi López-Tamayo, Raúl Ramos, Antonio Di Paolo and Jordi Suriñach. The aim of the project MOBI-TWIN is to use big data and agent-based modelling to analyse the impact of changing patterns of spatial mobility on EU regions and envisage policies to counterbalance their effects in terms of demographics, society, welfare system and labour market.

The project, within the field of Regional Science and Urban Economics, will analyse the changing drivers of spatial mobility based on human mobility behavior. It will examine the new balance rising between the different forms of spatial mobility (permanent, circular, temporal) and their effects on EU regions following the changing nature of regional attractiveness. By means of agent-based modelling it will capture and assess the impact of changing patterns of spatial mobility in terms of demographics, society, welfare system and labour market. It will use the insights to envisage place-based policies for harnessing the positive outcomes of twin transition. Specific attention will be placed on the ways in which the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 and Brexit have affected freedom of movement between EU regions.

Our researcher Mònica Serrano, expert in Environmental and Resource Economics, International Trade and Macroeconomics, leads another Horizon Europe project titled “TRIGGER (SoluTions foR mItiGatinG climate-induced hEalth thReats)”, working together with our researcher Alexandrina Stoyanova and our postdoctoral researcher Francisca Toro.

The general objective of H2020 project TRIGGER is to deepen current understanding of the complex linkage between climate (namely meteorological and climatic conditions), human health, and ecosystems (exposome framework) and to use this knowledge in practice to advance society up-take at both personal and policy level.  In this context, TRIGGER will identify, monitor, and quantify direct and indirect impacts of climate change induced environmental hazards on human health through the direct collection of health, weather-climate, environmental and socio-economic data with user-friendly tools (sensors, simplified models, and data hub).

The research activities lead to construct a concrete and workable toolbox, policy briefs and guidelines to support policy and decision makers in developing and applying climate actions supported by up-to-date medical scientific evidence, as well as to release educational activities and materials to raise awareness of the climate-health connections to the wider society.

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