Maurizia Castellari & Alessia Careccia
Developing innovative bio-based ingredients is only part of MARMADE’s ambition. Ensuring that these solutions meet the needs of consumers, stakeholders, and the market is equally important. Within the project, Work Package 6 helps bridge scientific research with the people who will ultimately shape, use, and benefit from its results.
As Work Package 6 Leader, Maurizia Castellari and Alessia Carecciafrom APRE coordinate activities on stakeholder engagement, consumer acceptance, and the Multi-Actor Approach, helping ensure that MARMADE’s research is shaped through collaboration across the entire value chain.
“The focus of WP6 is to integrate stakeholders’ and consumers’ perspectives into research activities from the early stages, fostering co-creation processes and aligning product development with market needs, societal expectations, and regulatory requirements.” explain Castellari and Careccia.
To achieve this, MARMADE follows a structured engagement process that began with desk research, stakeholder mapping and the creation of a stakeholder registration platform. Throughout the project, stakeholders and end-users will continue to contribute through surveys, workshops and dedicated meetings, providing valuable feedback that supports the scientific work packages and helps shape the project’s research and innovation activities.
Among the planned activities are two experimental kitchen sessions, where professional chefs will test the ingredients developed within MARMADE in real culinary applications.
“These sessions will allow us to gather practical insights and validate the ingredients’ performance from a professional gastronomic perspective.” says Castellari.
Maintaining active stakeholder participation throughout a four-year project is not without challenges. Beyond identifying the right stakeholders, the project must sustain their engagement over time and ensure that their contributions are reflected in project outcomes.
“Stakeholder fatigue can occur, but it can be effectively mitigated by making stakeholders aware that their contributions can really drive meaningful change, as well as by clearly integrating their feedback into project outcomes.” Castellari and Careccia note.
The team also highlights that engaging stakeholders in highly technical research projects requires close collaboration with the scientific partners to ensure that the right expertise is involved at every stage.
Continuous dialogue with stakeholders and end-users helps keep MARMADE’s research grounded in real needs and expectations. In this way, WP6 strengthens the relevance, acceptance, and future market readiness of the project’s solutions.
