<< Background >>On March 7, 2019, the women’s European Committee of COPA, held the conference “Strong rural women 4 strong rural Europe”. The conference dealt with the gender gap in agriculture all over Europe and concluded with the realization that further action and initiatives need to follow on a European and member states’ level in order to increase the number of female entrepreneurs participating in the agricultural sector. As it was pointed out, in order to achieve the above, focus should shift to educating and facilitating women’s access to agricultural training and life-long learning based on their specific needs, and social contexts.All above realizations are supported by official European Statistics which reveal that the agricultural sector in the EU is a male dominated sector with only 28,7% (2016) of farm managers being women, a percentage that has slightly increased in the years from 2005 to 2016, indicating that female farmers are holding steady, (Agriculture, Forestry and Fishery Statistics- 2020 edition). It was also indicated that only 8,9% of farm managers had full agricultural training, 22,7% had basic agricultural training, while the majority of farmers only had practical experience. Along those lines, the article published by the EC on 8 March 2021, entitled “Females in the field” highlights the importance of women in agriculture, as well as EC’s commitment in supporting them through the income support system, the rural development funds and the CAP. Even though above realizations are embraced by the official European Bodies, little action is taken to overturn the existing state of women in agriculture. The situation is even more alarming with regards to women in rural areas where they represent 45% of the economically active population, and about 40% of them work on family farms. However, the number of women showcasing entrepreneurial initiative is limited due to the lack of financial resources, training and lifelong learning.The proposed project “DEMETRA: Developing Entrepreneurial skills & tools for woMEn in agriculTure in Rural Areas” comes as response to this lack and was designed by a consortium of 7 partners form 6 different EU countries (Cyprus, Greece, Germany, Poland, Slovenia and the Czech Republic), in order to address the consortium's common interests and needs with regards to the above. In all participating countries it is observed that there low participation of women in agricultural entrepreneurial activity. The percentage of women farm managers in Greece, Cyprus, Slovenia and Poland is 27%-20% while in Germany and the Czech Republic is as low as 10% and 12% respectively. This project is an effort to create the conditions for women in rural areas to be involved in the agricultural sector, by providing the tools for educating them on agricultural entrepreneurship, and offer them the ability to develop an entrepreneurial mindset and skills.On the whole, the project addresses the need to better understand existing and needed competences of women in rural areas with regards to agricultural entrepreneurship and promote a more inclusive context for their participation in the filed. At the same time, this project, is the consortium’s response to the need of these women for education through a specifically designed innovative curriculum, platform and a mentoring scheme reflecting on women’s current needs on agricultural entrepreneurship training and also a response to lack of resources for VET providers on the topic.<< Objectives >>The overall objective of DEMETRA is to facilitate the development of agricultural entrepreneurial skills and tools for women in rural areas. In doing so the project aims at recognizing the needs and gaps with regards to women’s education and competences in the area of agricultural entrepreneurship and device the tools that will facilitate their education and overall knowledge in order to cover those needs and gaps.The specific objectives of the project are to:· Create a network of partners, share practices and strengthen their capacity to work transnationally through the cooperation in the full lifespan of the project and the joint activities proposed in this project in the area of women’s education on agricultural entrepreneurship. · In depth analysis of the context within which women agriprenuers are called to act by creating a clear picture of women agripreneurs, their level of education and competences in the field and their educational needs while at the same time recording the gaps and obstacles they need to tackle on a national and European level and developing policy recommendations.· Develop an innovative educational curriculum for educating women on greener, more sustainable models of agricultural entrepreneurship (as brought forward by the Green Deal and supported through the CAP policy) as well as other entrepreneurial skills.· Develop a digital tool for enabling women with limited access to education in order to further pursue their agripreneurial education.· Provide access for women in rural areas to educational programmes in the field of agricultural entrepreneurship, designed specifically based on their needs and provide them with up-to-date knowledge by experts and successful professionals.· Connect women agripreneurs with the labour market by bringing them into contact with agricultural businesses and agricultural stakeholders.· Raise awareness on the issues of gender inequalities within the agricultural labour market and the access to entrepreneurial education and skill training.These project objectives are in line with the Horizontal priorities of the ERASMUS+ programme on Inclusion and diversity in all fields of education, training, youth and sports and Environment and fight against climate change. Additionally, the project also addresses the sectoral priority of adapting vocational education and training to labour market needs.<< Implementation >>Throughout the lifespan of the project, a series of activities are going to be implemented which are all interconnected and complementary to each other in order to safeguard the achievement of all objectives set and the maximum possible impact of the overall project: Those activities are:5 Transnational Project Meetings (TPMs). (3 with physical presence M2, M13, M24 and two online meetings M7, M18). The TPMs will be held with the purpose of better coordination among the partners ensuring that they all will be aware of the project’s progress and the decisions taken for all aspects of the project’s monitoring and implementation processes. Additionally, the transnational project meetings will ensure that all partners are informed about the activities that need to be implemented, the timeframe of those activities and that they are actively contributing to discussions and decision-making procedures.1 short term staff training to take place on M13 of the project in Slovenia. The particular activity will be committed to educating staff members of the partners on DEMETRA platform and the curriculum that will be developed in order to acquire the knowledge required for implementing the pilot course in all partner countries and provide help in the use of the DEMETRA Platform. 7 multiplier events to take place one in each country and two in Cyprus which will involve a wider range of participants from all defined target groups (VET providers, Educational Institutions and other training organizations, Stakeholders in Agricultural, Women in rural areas and other individuals involved in agricultural activity, Businesses & StartUps in related sectors, Decision makers, Media and the General Public) aiming at creating an extended network of contacts for the outreach of project outcomes. This extended participation will be beneficial for the impact of the project’s results as well as for the purposes of reaching out to as many stakeholders and affected parties as possible.A comprehensive dissemination strategy to be implemented throughout the lifespan of the project drafted within the framework of a comprehensive communication campaign. The dissemination strategy will be implemented in order to achieve the maximum outreach possible for all the activities and results of the project. All dissemination activities implemented by the partnership will be supported by the grant for project management.<< Results >>The consortium will cooperate in order to successfully deliver the following project results within the set timeframes as they were recorded in the initial meeting for the drafting of the proposal:DEMETRA Matrix of Competences and Policy Recommendations Report.(PR1) A report will be drafted where the needs and gaps associated with women’s education in agricultural entrepreneurship will be identified. The Green Agripreneur DEMETRA Curriculum. (PR2)The curriculum will be an innovative approach to Women’s Agricultural Entrepreneurship with specific emphasis on environmental agricultural and entrepreneurship offering practical training for the development of skills and competences.DEMETRA The All Encompassing Platform. (PR3) Demetra platform will be designed as an OER in order to be publicly accessible. Through the platform, the curriculum that will be developed in Project Result 2 will be shared with the target groups, that is with women in rural areas who engage in agricultural entrepreneurship, VET providers and educational institutions, trainers, teaching staff and other stakeholders or beneficiaries in the field of agriculture. DEMETRA Pilot Course. (PR4) The pilot course will reflect on the common denominator of meeting the needs of the target group by offering them tools for developing competences and enriching their knowledge in the area of agricultural entrepreneurship based on the Curriculums developed in PR2.DEMETRA Mentoring Scheme. (PR5) Through this scheme mentors will offer up-to-date insights to women who aspire to develop their own business idea in the agricultural sector, as well as provide support and offer solutions to the obstacles and challenges that women may face in this process.Through all above mentioned results, DEMETRA aspires to have a positive impact on the participating organizations, on relevant stakeholders such as agricultural governmental and non governmental organizations, VET providers, Universities and academics who are interested in the field of women’s agricultural entrepreneurship. Additionally DEMETRA will also positively impact women from rural areas with limited access to education who want to develop an entrepreneurial action on the agricultural sector, as well as women from other areas who want to update and enrich their knowledge on agricultural entrepreneurship. Thus the consortium considers that the overall project through its activities and project results will be impacting relevant stakeholders and target audiences not only on a local and national level but on a European level as well.