Campania Districts and New Challenges for Agriculture: Preliminary Evaluation of Coherence with New European Rural Development Policy

In the framework of the new European agricultural policies, in 2019 the ‘Food District’ have been established in the Italian regions. A content analysis of seven semi-structured interviews of the representative Districts in the Campania region, shows some coherence and divergence with the European new strategies. Following a Grounded Theory, codes have been processed to highlight the main topics of these organizations, and then, clustered in nine macro-categories to evaluate the coherence with the European macro-objectives. Districts demonstrate a good adhesion with the new European policies. Notwithstanding, results point out the preference about the valorisation of products, territories, and local enterprises in spite of the importance of systems, research, and sustainability still far from rural areas strategies in the Campania region. The implementation of systems oriented to the diffusion of knowledge and innovation, the so-called AKIS seems not to be still perceived by Food Districts as mandatory to support territories valorisation and promotion. In this scenario, it is also recommended to stimulate discussion and collaboration among Universities; public and/or private entities and stakeholders working in the field; in order to facilitate the involvement of all actors within the District. Hence, Food District play a main role to the process of converting research results into real available innovation as an innovation broker ensuring a space of involvement for several territorial and international actors.