The Directorate-General of Research and Innovation, DG RTD, is publishing a new EUR 230 million call on nature under Horizon Europe. The call supports the EU Commission priorities ‘Sustaining our quality of life: food security, water and nature’ and ‘A new plan for Europe’s sustainable prosperity and competitiveness’.
Considering that humans depend on healthy and resilient ecosystems, this call pursues the objective of increasing the biodiversity spending in Horizon Europe Work Programme 2026-2027 by supporting additional R&I activities dedicated to biodiversity across pillar II of Horizon Europe.
The call includes 10 topics covering:
- understanding the nature and the extent of the effects of PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) on biodiversity and ecosystem services
- better understanding, anticipating and addressing the biodiversity benefits and impacts of the clean and digital industries
- systemic approaches to accelerate transformative change for biodiversity
- assessing direct and indirect drivers of biodiversity decline of invertebrates
- living labs co-creating solutions for the restoration of ecosystems addressing implementation bottlenecks and improving resilience to risks
- networking to scale up living labs for nature restoration solutions and to address bottlenecks to implementation
- innovative solutions to fight wildlife trafficking and to reduce invasion of invasive alien species
- cost-effective biodiversity monitoring for EU policies
- advancing interdisciplinary, data-driven research at the biodiversity- health interface under a One Health approach
- a stronger Global Ocean Observing System to enhance Europe’s strategic autonomy, climate resilience and biodiversity conservation
This call will be presented with the other horizontal calls during the Horizontal Activities info day, taking place online on 16 October 2026. Potential applicants are invited to attend and:
- learn about the policy background and objectives of the Nature call
- receive practical information on the topics open for application through live pitches
- better understand the project design, impact and implementation
- ask questions live through interactive Q&A Slido sessions
To identify suitable project partners to advance R&I on biodiversity, applicants are also invited to register for the Brokerage event on the Nature call organised on 19 October by the CARE4BIO project, the network of Cluster 6 National Contact Points.
More information
Horizon Europe Work Programme 2026-2027: Horizontal Activites
Horizon Europe info day: Horizontal Activities Nature and Bridging calls