X SOSTENIBILIDAD
"By 2040, sustainable bio-based materials and products such as construction materials, biochemicals, textiles, fertilisers and plant protection products and plastics are widely deployed in the EU. They provide fossil-free alternatives and create new, stable income streams in rural, coastal and industrial regions across Europe." - the European Comission's statement of its vision of the bioeconomy of the future begins with this quote, describing an economy that progressively substitutes fossil-based materials for renewable and circular alternatives.
The publication of the new strategic framework for a competitive and sustainable EU bioeconomy marks an important moment because it establishes how it aims to tranform sectors such as agrifood, construction, waste management, and the production of fertilisers.
What is the bioeconomy?
The bioeconomy covers any activity that uses biological resources - crops, algae, biodegradable urban waste, forestry waste or industrial subproducts - to generate sustainable products. It refers to more than just producing biomass and includes capturing the maximum value from existing resources. This is why the Commission underscores the importance of secondary biomass: plant cuttings, food waste, waste water, and even the organic content of waste water sludge from urban water treatment.
Many of these waste streams contain valuable nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorous, or potassium. The strategy highlights the potential to recuperate them from waste water treatment plants, biogass plants, or organic waste collection, converting them into circular fertilisers that can be returned to the land.
What are the main objectives of the EU's strategy?
The strategy offers a clear direction and responds to the need to manage urban and agricultural waste which continue to represent a large volume of unharnessed resources. Its implementation could influence decisions taken around how to organise the organic waste collection in a city, what technologies should be installed in a waste water treatment plant, or which products make it to our supermarket shelves.
In addition, the strategy prioritises sectors that can create local jobs and added value in rural and coastal areas. The strategy recognises that activities such as the production on biofertilisers, the manufacture of bio-based construction materials, the recuperation of nutrients, or the development of bioplastics could become motors of economic development.
How does the strategy attempt to drive their development?
The Commission wants to make it easier to innovate in the bioeconomy. To achieve this, it proposes simplification of procedures and clarification of rules that affect new bio-based materials and products, as well as encouraging testing areas where technologies can be tested before entering into the market. The strategy also seeks to create the necessary conditions for real markets to emerge for these products, encouraging public administrations and companies to incorporate bio-based solutions in sectors such as construction, energy, agriculture, and textiles.
An essential part of the plan lies in evaluating the sources of urban waste that already exist. Convering food waste into compost or biofertilisers, tranforming waste water into recuperated nutrients, or producing biogas from municipal waste are concrete examples of how local economies can be strengthened while reducing environmental impacts.
What opportunities does it present from SMEs?
The strategy highlights the fact that SMEs key to ensuring that the bioeconomy grows, and aims to help them to develop their ideas and bring them to the market. To achieve this, there are plans to provide them with access to assessment, testing spaces, and financing adapted to their size, as well as driving their incorporation into new value chains based on biological resources, especially in rural areas. In the Región de Murcia, there are already solid foundations on which to build, with innovative businesses that have experience working in this area. An example is Entomo Consultingwhich productes proteins from previously used organic waste, reducing the need for new resources and encouraging circularity. In the same way, European research projects with regional members such as HOOP have demonstrated the real potential of the circular bioeconomy, as well as the legal barriers to be overcome and that the European strategy seeks to overcome.
To find out more...
We hope this publication has helped you to understand the new EU Bioeconomy Straegy. We invite you to explore other publication about sustainability and the circular economy in the publications section section of this website.