Work Package 3 enables USAGE-NGs to empower smallholder farmers impacted by climate change to adopt digital agricultural technologies for monitoring, quantifying, and mitigating its effects, while fostering sustainable, environmentally friendly, and data-driven farming skills through innovative educational pathways like micro-credentials. Building on existing smart farming and IoT modules at TUM, the project will review and enhance content to meet smallholders’ needs, offering flexible, modular learning that can be combined and recognized across systems to form larger qualifications. The micro-credential framework will align with the European Qualifications Framework (EQF) and partner institutions’ standards, ensuring academic credit, transparency, and recognition across levels 5–8 with a workload of 5–6 ECTS.
Activity 3.1 – Research on relevant training offers, short courses (NQF Lvl 6-8)
A collection of research on training offers that concern climate change including potential for micro-credentials and all partners will provide relevant courses. It will provide information on relevant training offers, just in time solutions to empower smallholder farmers affected by climate change to use digital agricultural technologies to monitor, quantify and mitigate the impacts of climate change on their individual farms.
The report describing qualitative and quantitative results of desktop research on training offers and short courses with micro-credential development potential is being compiled. Survey data from 89 requests sent to 84 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in 11 countries provided information on 70 programs at EQF levels 5-8, including blended learning dominating delivery, local language preference, and topics related to climate change and sustainability.
Activity 3.2 – Modules development:Modules development
As part of the we will create courses for smart solutions in agriculture as a response to climate change that will enable diverse students of agricultural sectors including small farmers to use knowledge of the latest developments in smart farming technologies and to enable them to decide which of these technologies are suitable to ameliorate their own situation.
Based on survey results, discussions, and expert input, a “train-the-trainer” strategy (vector system) is considered more reasonable for long-term education than directly training small-scale farmers. As a short-term solution, MOOCs for farmers can be developed. An offline course about innovations and use cases of smart farming technologies is being developed, covering topics like drones, GNSS, sensors, field robotics, IoT, UI, and UX in agriculture. A hybrid course covering similar topics was conducted, and both courses will be evaluated to determine preferences for online/offline teaching. The most suitable topics for MOOCs will be determined, and a first MOOC will be developed and tested.
Activity 3.3 – Implementation of EU educational approaches (Micro-Credential, RPL, VNFIL, open access)
The project will set out guidance for the design and description of Micro-Credentials to facilitate their transparency and recognition. It will set out standard elements that are complement to EU standards. This activity will focus on quality, transparency, relevance, valid assessment, learning pathways, recognition, portable and learner cantered.
A Handbook for micro-credential development will be finalized within the project, focusing on criteria like relevance, reliability, recognition, and learner-centred approaches, and based on ECTS and EQF. The project partners research the role and relevance of micro-credentials in the agricultural sector and will adjust USAGE modules for competence-oriented short courses (5-15 ECTS) based on the European approach. The handbook details EU recommendations, guidelines, validation procedures, and links to EQF, guiding the design and quality assurance of micro-credentials.
Activity 3.4 – Networking and applying dissemination strategies
The first step is a collection of the thematically relevant aspects of Smart Farming and IoT. This compendium will be available digitally and linked to corresponding information collections in Europe, North America, and Asia where possible. This will enable dissemination of knowledge out of EU and make a project more global.
A sector analysis for agriculture education was conducted, forming a basis for creating a network of education experts. A second Master’s thesis is focusing on awareness and acceptance of smart farming technologies, challenges like climate change, and criticisms in the USA and EU. A network of universities and extension centres in North America (Midwest USA) has been established.