On 18 March 2026, the Catalan Community of Practice (CoP) of the LOESS project held a policy workshop at the Institut d’Estudis Catalans (Barcelona) to explore how public administrations can promote soil-health education through public policies. The activity was organised by the Catalan Association of Public Universities (ACUP) in collaboration with the Barcelona Metropolitan Area (AMB). It forms part of the third and final phase of LOESS, dedicated to organising dissemination campaigns to share the project’s results, including with policymakers.

The workshop gathered environmental officers from municipalities across the Barcelona Metropolitan Area, who are directly involved in developing and implementing local environmental and sustainability policies.

The event opened with welcoming remarks from Josep M. Vilalta, Executive Secretary of ACUP, and Noemí Ginovart, Head of the Environmental Education Section at AMB.

To initiate the session, Víctor López, professor at the Department of Science Education at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), led an interactive ice-breaker activity inviting participants to reflect on their knowledge of soil and soil-health education.

The programme continued with a presentation by Núria Roca, professor at the Department of Evolutionary Biology, Ecology and Environmental Sciences at the University of Barcelona (UB), who explained the value of soil to professionals working in public policy.

A central moment of the workshop was the presentation of the LOESS project’s policy brief and pedagogical resources, delivered by Núria Jové, Project Manager at ACUP.

Participants then took part in a discussion facilitated by Víctor López, focusing on which results were most relevant for their municipal work and how they could apply them to generate real and positive impact for local communities and educational centres.

The session concluded with closing remarks from Núria Jové, who summarised the main takeaways and outlined the next steps for the LOESS CoP in Catalonia, while also inviting participants to attend the project’s High-level Symposium, which will take place on 7 May in Barcelona.