The Regional Circular Living Lab Business Concept as an opportunity to foster sustainable rural development

In the Horizon 2020 project LIVERUR (https://liverur.eu) the Living Lab approach for the development of projects will be broadened and adapted to specifically rural problems, to sustainability and circular economy aspects. The Federal Institute of Agricultural Economics, Rural and Mountain Research is responsible for drafting a new business model concept, called RAIN (Regional circular living lab business concept) on the basis of various preliminary work in the course of the project and a specific literature research. Living Labs are user-centred, open-innovation and ICT enabled ecosystems often operating in a territorial context integrating concurrent research and innovation processes within a quadruple helix (Government, Industry/Agriculture, People, Research). Living Labs have been discussed and implemented for some years, but mostly in urban environments. LIVERUR analyses the specific rural context and problems in 13 pilot regions (AT, CZ, ES, FR, IT, LV, SI, MA, PT, TN, TR) and for various topics like agriculture, food processing, marketing, tourism, energy production. Selected projects using the RAIN concept approach will then be implemented and evaluated.

The RAIN concept comprises and integrates core business model elements, specific principles of the LIVERUR project approach (e.g. economic, ecological and social sustainability, circular economy, open innovation, stakeholder involvement) and in the same way exogenous regional, national and global influences (e.g. infrastructure, markets, climate, legal framework…). It seeks to enable innovative and sustainable projects and development in rural areas. LIVERUR project results are expected to show new approaches, aspects and suggestions to be integrated in the CAP discussions and in future CAP measures.