CONSIGLIO PER LA RICERCA IN AGRICOLTURA E L'ANALISI DELL'ECONOMIA AGRARIA

Their core work

CREA is Italy's largest public research organization dedicated to agriculture, food, and forestry. They conduct applied research across the entire agri-food chain — from plant genetics and breeding to sustainable farming systems, crop diversification, and agricultural economics. Their work directly supports European farmers and food producers through genomic tools, precision agriculture, pest management, and agroecological practices. They also contribute to forest monitoring, biomass supply chains, and climate adaptation strategies for Mediterranean crops.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In 2015–2018, CREA's portfolio was broad — spanning forest inventory systems, general crop management tools, agricultural waste recycling, and food policy. Their early keywords reflect this: harmonised forest data, bioeconomy outlooks, prevention, and general agriculture. From 2019 onward, the focus sharpened dramatically toward genomics, phenomics, and breeding — supported by FAIR data principles, machine learning, and citizen science approaches. They also deepened their engagement with agroecological practices and plant health diagnostics, reflecting Europe's shift toward sustainable and data-driven agriculture.

CREA is moving decisively toward data-intensive plant science — combining genomics, phenomics, and machine learning to accelerate breeding for climate-resilient crops, making them an increasingly attractive partner for precision breeding and digital agriculture projects.

How they like to work

CREA overwhelmingly operates as a consortium partner (48 of 54 projects), bringing domain expertise rather than leading project management. With 832 unique partners across 60 countries, they are a highly connected hub in Europe's agri-food research network — the kind of partner that opens doors to a vast web of collaborators. Their preference for RIA projects (36 of 54) shows they focus on research-stage work rather than close-to-market innovation actions.

CREA has collaborated with 832 unique partners across 60 countries, making them one of the most networked agricultural research bodies in Europe. Their reach spans well beyond the EU into global partnerships, with particularly strong ties across Mediterranean and Western European agricultural research communities.

What sets them apart

CREA covers virtually every aspect of agricultural research under one institutional roof — from molecular genetics to farm economics, from forestry to food safety. This breadth is rare; most partners in EU projects specialize in one slice. For consortium builders, CREA can fill multiple roles simultaneously (e.g., both the genomics work package and the farmer engagement activities), and their 60-country network means they bring connections that extend far beyond Italy.

Highlights from their portfolio

• Diverfarming
  Largest single-project funding for CREA at EUR 839K, addressing crop diversification across European farming systems with strong practitioner engagement.
• G2P-SOL
  Major genomics initiative linking genetic resources to phenotypes across all major Solanaceae crops (potato, tomato, pepper, eggplant) — a flagship for CREA's breeding expertise.
• ExpoSEED
  One of only three projects CREA coordinated, focused on the molecular control of seed yield — demonstrating their leadership capability in plant biology.