The project addresses the demand of educating doctoral students on high quality and international standards toincrease knowledge based solutions for sustainable agriculture and future farming systems – a topic of national, crossregionaland international relevance.
Large agricultural areas characterize the landscapes and economies of Russia and Kazakhstan and both countries seethe innovative development of this sector as a priority. Compared to this, skilled labour and innovation potential islacking. As a reaction, a number of initiatives target to build up human resources on all levels (farm workers, specialists,managers) and as well to improve higher education institutions (HEIs). Despite the progress in joining and pursuing theBologna process, brain drain of young talents and deficient and outdated educational offers for PhD studies impede thegoals of HEIs to become international competitive.
The consortium of 5 EU partners and 4 Russian and 4 Kazakhagricultural universities together with consultative and expert partners from accreditation, research and privatebusiness in Russia and Kazakhstan therefore specified the following objectives: