Vocational Innovation and Training for Animal Livestock

2026-07-22

The livestock sector plays a crucial role in Europe’s economy, food security, and rural development. However, it faces profound transformations driven by environmental sustainability goals, digitalization, and evolving consumer expectations. These changes require a workforce equipped with new skills to support competitiveness, ensure social fairness, and enhance resilience—objectives at the core of the European Skills Agenda. The Pact for Skills, as a major initiative under this agenda, emphasizes the importance of large-scale partnerships to drive upskilling and reskilling efforts, ensuring that sectoral transitions are inclusive and aligned with labour market needs. The livestock sector, with its strategic relevance, must leverage these frameworks to develop a comprehensive skills strategy that responds to current and future challenges. To this end, VITAL (Vocational Innovation and Training for Animal Livestock), a transnational partnership, brings together 25 partners from 9 countries, representing Higher Education (HE), Vocational Education and Training (VET), and the labour market. This multi-actor collaboration ensures a comprehensive approach to skills intelligence, addressing both immediate workforce needs and long-term sectoral strategies. The project aligns with the Blueprint for Sectoral Cooperation on Skills, a key initiative under the European Skills Agenda, which promotes strategic collaboration between stakeholders to design and implement sector-specific skills strategies. In this context, VITAL aims to develop and implement a sector-wide skills strategy for European livestock farming, define new occupational profiles at EQF levels 5 and 7, and design and update training programs in HE and VET (EQF levels 3-8) that cater to emerging job roles in the livestock industry. The project contributes directly to the twin transitions—green and digital—while reinforcing national and regional growth strategies.

Italy, Türkiye, Spain, Romania, Lithuania, Greece, Portugal, Cyprus, Belgium

2026-01-01