The Competitiveness Council, a configuration of the European Council, is “inviting the European Commission to secure policy coherence between the bioeconomy and other policies” and “stressing that a sustainable European bioeconomy should be one of the major components for the implementation of the European Green Deal”. EUBA supports this and agrees with the Council conclusion calling “upon Member States and the European Commission to implement the updated Bioeconomy Strategy without delay”.
Concrete actions
According to EUBA, this should be done with concrete actions, such as boosting investments and R&I related to the bioeconomy and ensuring an appropriate level of funding for the bioeconomy (via the future CAP and Horizon Europe), introducing market-creation incentives for bio-based products in strategic sectors and promoting public-private partnerships such as Circular bio-based Europe.
EUBA also reiterates the importance of a holistic approach, whereby the bioeconomy can offer possibilities for sustainable growth throughout the EU in rural, coastal and urban areas, potentially recovering marginal land, degraded soils and obsolete infrastructures in a sustainable way. It now calls upon the European Parliament to support new growth in the bioeconomy sector through the EU bioeconomy strategy and the Green Deal.
EUBA represents 12 leading European organisations in various sectors active in the bioeconomy:
- Bio-based Industries Consortium (BIC)
- European Association of Sugar Producers (CEFS)
- Confederation of European Forest Owners (CEPF)
- Confederation of European Paper Industries (CEPI)
- European Farmers and European Agri-Cooperatives (COPA-COGECA)
- European Renewable Ethanol Producers Association (ePURE)
- EuropaBio – The European Association for Bioindustries
- European Bioplastics (EUBP)
- The European Vegetable Oil and Protein Meal Industry (FEDIOL)
- Forest-based Sector Technology Platform (FTP)
- Primary Food Processors (PFP)
- Starch Europe – European Starch Industry Association
€ 2 trillion
The bioeconomy is already worth more than €2 trillion annually and employs over 18 million Europeans. Given the right conditions and a stable investment and policy environment, the bioeconomy is an important opportunity to help reduce reliance on resources of fossil origin, boost competitiveness and job creation, and to contribute to policy goals and initiatives, such as several of those under the EU Green Deal (including circular economy, CAP and farm to fork strategy, climate and zero waste objectives, sustainable finance and taxonomy).
