When it comes to the bioeconomy, 2025 is a year of both celebration and change. 2025 sees the 20th anniversary of the European bioeconomy. Within this timeframe, thanks to the incredibly transformative power of research and innovation (R&I), what started off as a research project has today become an economic reality. Going forward, R&I will continue to be extremely important to drive the industrial transformation. The global bioeconomy is projected to reach more than €27 trillion by 2050¹, and Europe has a chance to take the lead if it can keep the momentum going and scale up. Lifting the potential of the bioeconomy will require making more of the business cases of today and tomorrow.

Not so long ago, only hydrogen experts were convinced about the potential to decarbonize the energy sector in Europe. If you look at the hydrogen hype today, you wonder what has changed. It was a niche sector yesterday, and is supposed to be the norm tomorrow.

The message about the urgent need for action to deal with the threats to the environment and safeguard our planet’s future is inescapable. Every day, the news carries alarming stories about global warming; climate change; biodiversity loss; plastic pollution; deforestation; air pollution; melting ice caps and rising sea levels. Furthermore, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has recently released its Synthesis Report, a culmination of the work of hundreds of scientists who have assessed more than 100,000 pieces of scientific literature across six reports published between 2018 and 2023. According to scientists in the report, "There are multiple, feasible and effective options to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to human-caused climate change, and they are available now."