The aim of the SEEMLA project is the reliable and sustainable exploitation of biomass from marginal lands (MagL), which are used neither for food nor feed production and are not posing an environmental threat. The main target groups are regional authorities and public or private owners of MagLs, who can provide knowledge on land availability and are responsible for managing these. Furthermore foresters, farmers and the civil society affected by transformation of MagL into energy crop plantations are important cooperation partners for the project’s success. The initial challenge of the project is to define MagL. In order to achieve high yields on the MagL the goal is to develop and optimize cropping systems for special sites. The project focuses both on existing plantations of energy crops on MagL and on the establishment of new plantations on MagLs. General guidelines and manuals shall attract and help relevant stakeholders as well as piloting shall prove the feasibility of SEEMLA results. The first scenario will enable the assessment of good practice and the refinement of current practices, making them more sustainable (environmental, economic, social). The second approach will transfer good practices to underused MagL. The project will focus on three main objectives: the promotion of re-conversion of MagLs for the production of bioenergy through the direct involvement of farmers and foresters, the strengthening of local small scale supply chains and the promotion of plantations of bioenergy plants on MagLs. Moreover the expected impacts are: Increasing the production of bioenergy, farmers’ incomes, investments in new technologies and the design of new policy measures. The project team is balanced between scientific and technical partners as well as national and regional organisations. By including partners from South-East, Eastern and Central Europe the knowledge transfer between regions of different climatic and political backgrounds can be established.

Industrial Crops can provide valuable resources for high added value products and bioenergy. MAGIC aims to promote the sustainable development of resource-efficient and economically profitable industrial crops grown on marginal lands. To achieve that an up-to-date database of existing resource-efficient industrial crops will be developed with information on their agronomic characteristics, input requirements, yield performance and quality traits for end-use applications (WP1). A Decision Support System (DSS) will be developed and validated with the active involvement of farmers and end users. In parallel, current and future marginal lands in Europe facing natural constraints will be mapped, characterised and analysed to provide a spatially explicit classification that will serve as a basis for developing sustainable best-practice options for industrial crops (WP2). The most promising crop species will be identified taking advantage of the profound experience of the consortium and in a multi-actor approach with stakeholders. Further investigation actions include the creation of new breeding tools and strategies towards better crop varieties (WP3), the identification and optimization of appropriate agronomic practices with limited input requirements (WP4) and the development of suitable harvesting strategies and logistics to optimise the biomass supply-chains (WP5). The impact of MAGIC will be maximized by integrating sustainability aspects (covering environment, society and economy) of the value chains (WP6). Success stories of industrial crops in EU regions will be analysed addressing technical, environmental, economic and social issues to produce policy recommendations and best-practice guidelines for their promotion at local/regional level (WP7). The project results, database, maps and the DSS tool will be used as dissemination tools to increase farmers’ awareness and establish strong links with EIP AGRI (WP8).