EuroFIR AISBL - Annual Report 2020

The European food research landscape is changing with the building of research infrastructures and open science clouds, or is it catching up with something that EuroFIR has been doing since 2005? Our goal has always been to move towards open food, nutrition, and health science, underpinned by federated IT systems and collaborative, more cost-effective research. In 2020, Members would have been forgiven for thinking the biggest change would be Paul Finglas stepping down from the role of President. In fact, 2020 has seen significant changes in how EuroFIR functions because of the coronavirus and public health restrictions globally.

For the first time, but probably not the last, the 2020 General Assembly took place online, but the annual flagship event, EuroFIR's Food Forum, was cancelled. This was particularly challenging for the team, given both the short notice and the absence of Sidonie Pauchet (Office Manager), who was on maternity leave. It was also a test of the new joint Presidents, who are grateful for the support of Members and the Office.

The EuroFIR Office (Rue Washington, Brussels) was closed on 18th March 2020. Since then, staff have worked from home; some in Brussels, some elsewhere in Belgium, another in France, and several in the UK. EuroFIR has always been familiar with remote working; to be honest, most of us were in our offices only rarely before this all started. Nevertheless, mandatory home working has created new or different issues with communication and sharing of information, which the team has overcome with weekly (online) catch-up meetings, more use of online tools, increasing reliance on social media channels, and the websites, to the extent that we now know the main EuroFIR site must be relaunched during 2021, updating the technology and content.

There were many achievements in 2020, despite the pandemic. For example, EuroFIR made an overall surplus (ca. 47K EUR) and we planned and launched our first online Membership campaign. In doing so, we also created new resources presenting EuroFIR to the world. EuroFIR welcomed 10 new Members, including one Associate Member from Israel, and implemented improvements to FoodEXplorer based on user feedback. Increasingly, EuroFIR is also lobbying for Members' interests in the development of research infrastructures, including METROFOOD-RI and the proposed FNH-RI, as well as the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC), directly and indirectly as a Beneficiary of FNS-Cloud.

The Directors are grateful for the continued work of the Office, especially under challenging circumstances, and we would like to thank Paul (Managing Director), Angelika, Hana, Jérémy, Mark, Siân, and Sidonie, as well as the interns, Irene, Alba, and Marjola, for their support. Likewise, we - Maria and I - would like to thank the Directors for their dedication to EuroFIR, alongside their professional responsibilities. Doubtless, 2021 will bring its challenges and changes, but we can look forward with optimism to meeting face-to-face (eventually) because although online meetings are useful, they are not nearly as efficient or as effective as we might have imagined.