National Adaptation Hubs - Bringing together the national level with the engaged regional and local levels (multi-level governance)

Expected Outcome:

In support of the implementation of the Mission on Adaptation to climate change and of the upcoming European Climate Adaptation Plan , the successful project is expected to contribute to multi-level governance for climate adaptation by addressing all of the following outcomes:

• The relevant national governance for innovation and climate adaptation is further engaged and mobilised to contribute to the objectives of the Adaptation Mission and benefit from it. In turn, the Mission fosters multi-level governance, supporting Member States, regions and local authorities in their efforts to implement the European Climate Law’s requirements on climate adaptation, and to further develop and update their adaptation plans.
• Mission solutions are disseminated beyond the regions and local authorities actively involved in the Mission and peer learning opportunities (within and outside) the Mission are strengthened, to bridge the gap between the EU, the national and local levels.

Scope:

Regional and local authorities are the target group of the proposed activities and as such they are not expected to participate directly in the consortium, but they should benefit from the project funded by this action.

The project is expected to last until the end of the Mission, i.e. end of 2030.

The project will be a follow-up to the project stemming from HORIZON-MISS-2024-CLIMA-01-02, and hence it should collaborate with such existing project to ensure a smooth transition from one project’s implementation to the other, maintaining the continuity of Mission Adaptation’s support for the national hubs. Moreover, the project should ensure lessons learnt from the project stemming from HORIZON-MISS-2024-CLIMA-01-02 are duly taken into account.

Proposals should address two axes of action for which all the following aspects should be addressed:

1. National adaptation hubs

National adaptation hubs (one per EU country and at least a single horizontal facility for Associated Countries) are meant to be light, agile, and flexible, to be tailored to the national context. They consist in a sort of task force or working group composed of the relevant contact points from each level of governance relevant in the individual countries.

The hubs should:

• Continue and extend the “National adaptation hubs” established by the Adaptation Mission
• Build on the key community systems and enabling conditions identified in the Mission Implementation Plan to identify the priority areas of work of the “National adaptation hubs”. These priority areas should reflect what is included in the National Strategies and/or Plans on Adaptation to Climate Change, while maintaining enough thematic flexibility over time to be able to integrate the priority themes addressed by the future European Climate Adaptation Plan.
• Feed relevant knowledge and contribute to national, regional and local authorities’ efforts related to the adaptation objectives in the Climate Law – with particular reference to the adoption and implementation of national adaptation strategies and plans.

Beneficiaries may provide financial support to third parties to allow for the establishment, animation and facilitation of National Adaptation Hubs. The support to third parties can only be provided in the form of grants, with a maximum of one grant per EU Member State or Associated Country. The maximum amount to be granted to each third party is EUR 200,000.

To implement the support to third parties, the consortium should include partners with relevant operational and financial experience and viability.

2. Grouping scheme

A structural grouping scheme should be put in place to bring together regions and local actors facing similar challenges, to facilitate the dissemination of knowledge within and beyond the regions and local authorities involved in the Adaptation Mission. To that end, the scheme should:

• Include groups or pairs from the same EU Member State (within each “national adaptation hub”) as well as between different countries, helping consolidate the multi-level governance.
• Identify the right grouping and pairing participants from Mission-funded and Mission-related activities to other regions in the EU, with particular attention to vulnerable regions.
• Group or pair less advanced regions with front-runners (when relevant). Such knowledge transfer will help less advanced regions contribute more effectively to National-level efforts (see point on Climate Law requirements).
• Ensure close connections with the Mission's Community of Practice.

Links to the Mission and to other projects and initiatives

As a coordination and support action, collaboration with the Mission and other initiatives will be key to ensure the success of this action. In particular, close collaboration should be sought with all the following actors:

• Mission secretariat – to ensure the relevance of the activities within the Mission
• The Mission Implementation platform^[1]– the project funded under this topic should closely cooperate with the Mission Implementation Platform and ensure synergies – where relevant- with the exchanges taking place within the Adaptation Mission’s Community of Practice. The collaboration should be formalized through a Memorandum of Understanding to be concluded as soon as possible after the projects' starting date.
• The project stemming from HORIZON-MISS-2026-01-CLIMA-02 to ensure synergies and coordinate the respective activities

The project is also expected to have regular exchanges of best practices with the other EU Missions^[2], e.g. in the area of stakeholder and citizen engagement, long-term sustainability of Mission hubs, and building of synergies. Moreover, it will work closely with Horizon Europe National Contact Points^[3] to enhance their activities, such as raising awareness about Mission Adaptation funding activities through information events and communication tools.

The project funded under this topic is expected to closely cooperate with the different projects funded by the Adaptation Mission, in particular with the project stemming from HORIZON-MISS-2026-01-CLIMA-04.

Collaboration with other relevant existing initiatives is also encouraged.

Applicants should acknowledge these elements and already account for them in their proposal, making adequate provisions in terms of resources and budget to engage and collaborate with the Mission.

This action supports the follow-up to the July 2023 Communication on the EU Missions assessment.

[1] Initially established by MIP4Adapt and extended under the contract CINEA/2025/OP/0014

[2] Including by contributing to relevant initiatives aiming at strengthening evidence-informed policy-making for mission-oriented innovation.

[3] Including by cooperating with the NCP4Missions project