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1. What is bioeconomy?

Website: Hamburg Open Online University
Kurs: Process engineering for the bioeconomy
Buch: 1. What is bioeconomy?
Gedruckt von: Gast
Datum: Montag, 21. Juli 2025, 19:52

Beschreibung

This book contains all basic information on bioeconomy.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1. What is bioeconomy?

 

What you should know:

  • The bioeconomy encompasses the economic sectors that produce, use or process bio-based raw materials
  • The term bioeconomy emerged from a political program to promote innovation in the industrial use of renewable resources
  • 17 countries have their own bioeconomy strategy
 

The bioeconomy

The bioeconomy encompasses the primary production sectors (agriculture, forestry and fisheries) as well as industries that use or process bio-based raw materials, such as the pulp and paper industry, food industry, wood processing industry, chemical and pharmaceutical industry, biotechnology and parts of the energy industry. In a revised version of the bioeconomy strategy from 2018, services that use biological resources and processes are now also included in the bioeconomy (e.g. tourism, transportation or architecture). 

The five goals of the bioeconomy (see also figure below) are: 

  •  Ensuring food and nutrition security 
  •  Sustainable management of natural resources
  •  Reducing dependence on non-renewable and non sustainable - domestic or non-domestic - resources 
  •  Climate protection and adaptation to climate change
  •  Creating jobs and maintaining European competitiveness
The concept of bioeconomy is also seen in the context of social change towards a post-industrial society. The focus here is on the transition from a fossil-based economy to a bio-based economy. It is about the optimal use of renewable raw materials by minimizing waste and losses, but also about expanding the raw material base by tapping into previously unused resources such as waste and residual materials. The bioeconomy also follows the approach of a circular economy with virtually infinite availability of resources. In reality, however, there are natural limits, as land, water and freshwater resources, for example, are not infinitely available.

Conditions for the advancement of the bioeconomy are:

  • natural resources
  • Labor resources
  • Knowledge resources
  • Capital resources
  • Infrastructure

The learning material provided here focuses primarily on natural resources, knowledge and, to some extent, the necessary infrastructure for the bioeconomy.

Goals of the bioeconomy by Anne Roedel, adapted by Jana Schultz (CC BY-SA)

 

 1.1 Evolution of the term bioeconomy

According to Birner (2018), the origin of the term can be traced back to the late 1960s. Birner (2018) also provides a nice overview of the history of the term and concept of the bioeconomy.
 

The roots

The origin of the term is often attributed to the Romanian mathematician and economist Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen, who described the concept of a bioeconomy in the mid-1970s. In his almost philosophical essay from 1977 (see literature overview), he analyzes the socio-economic system of the Western world, its relationship to the use of natural resources and the connection with poverty in less developed countries. He draws attention to the fact that biological resources are limited as a basis for economic activities and, in contrast to the classical economic approach, are not equally distributed and available.
 
 
Ausschnitt des Artikels von Georgescu-Roegen (1977) über Bioökonomie
Excerpt from the article by Georgescu-Roegen (1977) by Anne Rödl (CC BY-SA)

The article was strongly influenced by the impressions of the oil price crisis in the 1970s and pointed out even then that humanity must respect the earth's natural carrying capacity, that natural resources are not infinitely available and that the paradigm of growth should no longer be advocated. This was an unconventional approach at the time, as a belief in progress and technology had prevailed since the end of the Second World War, giving humanity a sense of omnipotence. The famous publication by Meadows et al.“The limits to growth” in 1972 marked a turning point, since when the finite nature of natural resources has received more and more attention. Much of Georgescu-Roegen's essay (1977) still seems very relevant from today's perspective.

 

Significance for EU policy

In the early 2000s, the topic of bioeconomy was placed on the political agenda by the EU Commission (Strategy on Biotechnology 2002). At that time, however, the focus was still more on biotechnology as a “future technology” and not necessarily on achieving various environmental goals.  Only later did the concept develop into an approach for solving a variety of future challenges, such as population growth, depletion of fossil resources or environmental pollution. Funding was provided in the 7th Research Framework Program to lay the foundations for a bioeconomy based on scientific findings in various disciplines (agriculture and forestry, energy production, chemistry and biotechnologies).
In addition to the EU member states, other countries also developed their own bioeconomy strategies in the following years.
 
In the early years, the prevention of climate change through the substitution of fossil fuels dominated the commitment to the bioeconomy. Increasingly, however, concerns were expressed about the competition for land for food production and other environmental impacts of increased biomass use. As a result, research and development has since focused primarily on tapping new sources of biomass from by-products, waste or plants that are not used as food. The economic benefits of biotechnological innovations have also come to the fore. At the Rio+20 UN Assembly in 2012, the green economy was then postulated as a means of achieving sustainable development, with the bioeconomy being seen as part of the green economy.
 
The EU also published its bioeconomy strategy in 2012. In the revised version of the strategy from 2018, the focus is strongly on sustainability and climate targets that are to be achieved with the help of the bioeconomy in the EU, as well as on modernizing and strengthening the industry.  In this sense, the bioeconomy is seen more as an instrument for achieving various EU policy goals (e.g. Green Deal, forestry and agricultural policy, Circular Economy Action Plan).
 
According to the EU Bioeconomy Monitoring Dashboard, the bioeconomy sectors contributed EUR 657 billion to value added in 2019. This corresponded to 4.7% of European value added.
 
 
A current report on the status and future development of European bioeconomy policy can be accessed here. 

Titelblatt der überarbeiteten EU Bioökonomie-Strategie

Cover page of the revised EU Bioeconomy Strategy from Anne Rödel (CC BY-SA)

1.2 Seeing the bigger picture

The motto of the Science Years 2020 and 2021 in Germany was “Bioeconomy”. Among other things, the website offers an overview of the diverse topics of the bioeconomy.

This brochure from the European Bloom project offers a brief impression of innovative bio-based products: 

Innovative bio-based products

Would you like to enrich your lessons with exciting topics from the bioeconomy? On the website of the EU project BLOOM you will find numerous ideas and instructions in various languages

Teaching materials on bioeconomy

Analysis and thoughts for an ecological economy from 1988 (Juan Martinez-Alier und Frank Beckenbach: Beiträge zur ökologischen Ökonomie, Schriftenreihe des IÖW 19/88): 

Analysis and Thoughts on econogical economy

Critical voices should not be neglected either. Bioeconomy is not sustainable and environmentally friendly per se: 

A study by the European Commission's Joint Research Center (JRC) examines the regional development of bioeconomy strategies within the European Union in 2022: https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC128740

Overview on bioeconomy strategie world wide:
 https://biooekonomie.de/en/topics/in-depth-reports-worldwide

Bioeconomy monitoring system of the EU:

Various graphics provide information on the development of the bioeconomy based on different criteria https://knowledge4policy.ec.europa.eu/bioeconomy/monitoring_en 

 

 

1.3 Bioeconomy processes

In the bioeconomy, a large number of different processes are used with the aim of generating uniform products from a biological, often non-uniform raw material stream. Among other things, biological, chemical, mechanical and thermal processes are used to convert the biomass into either intermediate products or end products. A combination of different processes is also often used.

Various procedures are presented in more detail in the following chapters. These include, among others:

  • The biological process of anaerobic fermentation, in which various microorganisms convert the biomass into biogas via various intermediate products,
  • the chemical process of producing viscose fibers, whereby pulp is first dissolved in caustic soda and then “spun” into fibers in an acidic precipitation bath,
  • various mechanical processes (in principle, for example, all harvesting processes can be counted as mechanical processes); in particular, the chapter on building and construction discusses various ways of using mechanically pretreated wood (e.g. in the form of beams) as construction timber,
  • thermal processes in which the biomass is treated under the influence of temperature; for example, gases, oils or solids can be produced from biomass.

Depending on the process and the desired product, different methods are used and combined. In the following chapters, you will learn more about individual bioeconomy processes and products.