Agriculture forms an important part of the economy of the regions and countries in which the project partners are located. Many high-quality traditional foods are produced that are not widely distributed, from indigenous varieties of crop plants and animal breeds to unique processed products and regional speciality dishes.

The challenges to be effectively addressed by the LocFood project are: Economic development(challenge: under-developed local economy) and Environmental protection(challenge: threatened biodiversity and natural resources), Social issues(challenge: significant gender issues in employment and general unemployment in the rural areas, under-developed knowledge-based society) and Culture preservation and promotion(challenge: threatened local cultural heritage, and under-developed tourism and gastronomy market). The consortium is formed to cover all project dimensions.