Syllabus proposal for a self-paced, modular e-learning platform aiming to empower young European agrifood entrepreneurs

Most Food Science and Technology curricula are very technical driven, preparing the students to meet the industry demands or embrace a researching career. Although this model accomplishes its purpose when the students follow that path, it also understimulates their entrepreneurial creativity, potentially adding to the overall inertia of starting new businesses. On the other hand, nearly all the available didactic materials that cover entrepreneurship are very generic in their approach and lack the scientific know-how required to tackle the particular challenges of the agrifood industry. To make these ends meet, the YOUAREIN (YOUng AgRifood European INnovators) project was developed, aiming to provide a framework of e-learning events that will culminate in a self-paced, open access, modular course platform focused on the journey from the ideation to the full development and production of an agrifood product. A syllabus proposal for this project was drawn in modules, each corresponding to specific learning objectives, to allow the participants to match the received content to their specific needs. Additionally, to provide a framework that would unify all learning objectives, an example of an innovative food product was included, following every step of the process and serving as an overarching theme of the whole platform. Throughout the entire course syllabus, technical concepts of novel food engineering, designed to assist in the development of a prototype and the later transition to a scaled-up production, were intertwined with practical tools for the creation of innovative and sustainable business models, resulting in a multidisciplinary approach to agrifood entrepreneurship where each decision is influenced by the holistic perspective of the process.