The shift in agriculture has occurred naturally until recently, children have picked up and worked on their parents' holdings, giving the generational shift within the family. This trend has broken down in recent years and more and more people have no direct relationship with the agricultural world. Although this change in trend brings hope to the sector, new challenges emerge. The first is the lack of experience, the lack of knowledge, considering the origin of the new additions to the sector. The second is the lack of soil.

To answer some of these problems, agricultural testing spaces have been born. In France they have already come a great way in this area, they have hundreds of active spaces of this kind. In the Spanish state, in Catalonia they began a few years ago, and in the Basque Country we also started: Bizkaia (Vivero), Navarra (Zunbeltz) and Iparralde (Treatu).

But what is the rural space test? Testing process, training itinerary, an environment for the creation of an agricultural company. In these environments the testers come with an idea, wanting to try. The space offers all the necessary resources to carry out this idea: land, infrastructure, tools, training, legal protection, monitoring by professionals in the sector, etc. It's a learning period and interim installation.

It is linked to the needs and resources of the territory, so each agricultural test space is different to meet the challenges of the environment. And what I love presenting today is a new agricultural test space, Ale.

The unit project is based on the environment of Vitoria, very close to the city. It will be possible to test various agricultural ecosystems: biointensive horticulture, extensive horticulture, extensive crops of dryland, fruit, livestock and forest management through animals. The project is built within a framework of collaboration, supporting among them agricultural ecosystems.

This project is aimed at anyone with ideas and motivation who wants to live from agriculture and livestock. The process takes a year and a half. During the first six months the participants will be trained in all ecosystems and at the end they will choose the line of work that motivates them the most. These six months will offer testers a unique opportunity to meet each other and create cooperative projects in order to ensure success. At the end of these six months, they will be able to demonstrate their idea for a year in the agricultural ecosystem they choose. At the end of this period, the aid shall be granted for an additional year as long as the final installation is completed.

In the rural area Altza test is offered a wide route, with numerous lines of work and with the collaboration of professionals of the sector. Open the news among your friends and acquaintances and contact us for more information: 945162696 cea@vitoria-gasteiz.org

The time has come to work, go!