Co-Producing Ecosystems for Nature-Positive Innovation: Evidence from a Mountain Living Lab in Toerbel, Switzerland

Mountain and rural areas are increasingly recognised as critical arenas for advancing sustainability transitions, yet they continue to face multiple, interacting stressors, including biodiversity loss, climate pressures, demographic change, and fragile mountain livelihoods. Smart and community-led solutions have the potential to strengthen resilience in these socio-ecological systems; however, their effectiveness depends on the presence of specific competences within local communities. Drawing on insights from the Horizon Europe RURACTIVE project, this study examines the combinations of knowledge, skills, abilities, attitudes, and behaviours required to co-produce smart, biodiversity-friendly, and nature-positive solutions in place-based mountain contexts. We identify six core competence categories—digital and technological, technical, social, organisational, governance, and financial and new business model competences—that underpin the capacity of rural actors to engage in nature-positive innovation. Our analysis shows that isolated skills are insufficient. Instead, transformative potential emerges when these competences function as an interconnected “competence ecosystem,” aligned with local governance arrangements, institutional capacities, and socio-ecological conditions. To illustrate these dynamics empirically, we present evidence from a developing mountain Living Lab in a small community of Toerbel, Canton of Valais, Switzerland. This Living Lab provides a structured setting for the co-production of knowledge, enabling community members, researchers, practitioners, and local authorities to jointly identify competence gaps and test solutions that especially support biodiversity recovery, climate resilience, and social justice and inclusion. The Living Lab in Toerbel underscores how participatory governance, trust-building, and the integration of scientific, local, and traditional knowledge can foster transformative pathways while also revealing persistent challenges related to digital literacy, climate and biodiversity-related issues, and cross-sectoral coordination. This study highlights the importance of strengthening competence ecosystems as a foundation for enabling mountain and rural communities to act as agents of change. Investing in such ecosystems can accelerate inclusive, context-sensitive, and nature-positive transitions in mountain socio-ecological systems.

Acknowledgment: This study has been conducted within HE RURACTIVE and EU COST Action MARGISTAR (CA21125) projects. RURACTIVE has received funding from the European Union under the Horizon Europe grant agreement No. 101084377, from the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) and the UK Research and Innovation.