The Agraria Department of the Università degli Studi Mediterranea di Reggio Calabria, in order to promote among the students the knowledge on the subject of sustainability and innovation, and of good business practices and successful experiences, supported by the Rural Development Programs (PSR), joined the Agricultural Hackathon of Italy, conceived by Rete Rurale National and Vazapp. The two-day event, organized thanks to the support of the Italian Ministry for Agricultural, Food and Forestry Policies, Crea and Ismea, will be held on 16 and 18 March next; the event, which takes place online, involves the participation of students and teachers from the 17 universities who participated in the Rural4University project.
During the meetings, agricultural entrepreneurs from different regions of Italy will describe their business reality, the geographical context, the type of work they do and what they have managed to achieve thanks to the support of the RDP.
The event represents for students a valid moment of comparison, study and debate on the implementation of the measures of the rural development programs, and will also allow them to engage in group activities aimed at co-creating sustainable and innovative paths, to generate changes to the agricultural system.
In particular, the training-intervention courses will be divided into four sessions, dedicated respectively to listening to company stories, new paths and the problems that farmers have to face in this period of Covid-19 emergency (session 1. Farmers); strategic training with professionals working on new scenarios (session 2. Labs); group work to reflect together with agronomists, teachers and regional officials and develop innovative proposals and solutions (session 3. Team work); sharing of project ideas and team proposals, to be combined with company challenges (session 4. Challenges).
The achievement of the certificate of participation by students who had already passed the Rural4university E-learning course will also be considered valid as recognition of the CFU related to training internships and company internships.

Students wishing to participate in the Hackathon Rural4University2020 must send an email to dfortugno@unirc.it by 12.00 on Wednesday 10 February 2021.