---
id: ch11-guide-atlas
type: spine
title: "How to use the Atlas of best practices: search, compare, contribute"
readingTime: 2
standalone: true
core: false
teaser: "Before designing a measure, check whether a region has already tried it. Six steps through the Atlas, and how your own practice gets in."
parent: null
diagram: fig-guide-atlas
recallQ: "How does a regional team use the Atlas of best practices before designing a measure, and how does its own practice get added?"
recallA: "It filters entries by theme and region, opens practices whose context resembles its own, reads what they changed and reuses them in pilot work, reports or advice. To add its own practice, it prepares a case description with location, thematic tags and results and passes it to the Atlas editors (CCSS), whose editorial flow publishes it."
highlights:
  - "Public at atlasbestpractices.com; content grew substantially in the Beta period"
  - "Filter by theme and region; compare contexts before copying"
  - "Entries are reused in pilot experimentation, reporting and advisory work"
  - "Links from practices to e-market and local-food tools are not yet defined"
status: accepted
concept: atlas-of-practices
lang: en
lens: generic
depth: intro..standard
formalism: none
visuality: balanced
lengthBand: standard
genre: worked-example
state: edited
carriers: prose|diagram
---

**When to use it:** you are about to propose a measure for a RAP or a project and want to know whether something similar has been tried, where, and with what result.

## What you need

- A browser: **[atlasbestpractices.com](https://atlasbestpractices.com)**. D4.2 describes the Atlas as a front-facing resource, not only a back-office repository (§3.11).
- A clear description of your own context: the type of region, the theme and the actors involved.

## Steps

1. **Open the Atlas and search or browse.** Entries are searchable and browsable, with a thematic presentation (D4.2 §3.11).
2. **Filter by theme and region.** Use the activity tags, for example short food supply chains, stakeholder engagement or cross-border cooperation, and then the location.
3. **Open the candidates.** Each entry carries a location, activity tags, a description and a results field. Read the results first: they say what the practice changed.
4. **Compare contexts.** D4.2 stresses comparison and future adaptation; a practice from a region like yours (a border area, a short-chain food economy) transfers more easily than an abstract recommendation.
5. **Reuse it.** D4.2 names three uses: pilot experimentation, reporting and advisory contexts, for example as a cited example in a RAP measure or a policy brief.
6. **Document your own practice.** Prepare a case description, location, thematic tags and results. The Atlas editors, CCSS, run the editorial flow that prepares and publishes entries.

## What you get

A short list of tested practices with their place and results, and a way to make your own work visible to other regions in the same format. Three entries worth opening first are in [the Atlas anchor](#c/atlas-of-practices).

## Watch out

- An atlas is only as useful as **the breadth and comparability of its content**; D4.2 notes that without enough material the structure is "technically sound but operationally weak". Check how far an entry's context matches yours.
- The **data model** was recently adjusted and is still being stabilised, so fields can differ between older and newer entries.
- **E-market linkages**, meaning links from practices to local-food or regional-market tools, still need an operational definition. Do not count on them yet (D4.2 §3.11).

Practices show what worked in one place. The [key exploitable results](#c/key-exploitable-results) are the tools and models meant to continue after 2026.

**Sources:**
- D4.2 PoliRuralPlus Platform Beta, §3.11 Atlas of Best Practices and e-market linkages. [PDF](https://www.poliruralplus.eu/docs/421/D4.2_PoliRuralPlus_Platform_Beta.pdf)
- Atlas of best practices (edited by CCSS). [atlasbestpractices.com](https://atlasbestpractices.com)