Turning industrial biotechnology into a European success story
Industrial biotechnology holds the key to solving major global challenges today, including climate change, dwindling fossil fuel resources and the need to develop a more sustainable and resource-efficient economy. However to date, major hurdles continue to hamper the full exploitation of its potential in Europe. These hurdles include technological bottlenecks, market entry and institutional barriers as well as funding challenges. An integrated approach is needed to overcome these hurdles, with a clear perception of their nature and the way they interrelate. This is where BIO-TIC, a new EU-funded project, comes in. Roadmapping for accelerated take-up Launched in September 2012, BIO-TIC aims to establish an overview of the barriers to biotech innovation and design a clear action plan to overcome them. The three-year project is “a solutions approach” centered on a solid roadmapping exercise that will involve a broad stakeholder base from industry, knowledge organisations, governments and civil society. Three intermediary roadmaps will focus on market assessments and projections, research and innovation as well as non-technological barriers such as feedstock. A series of stakeholder workshops will take place at national and European level to reach a comprehensive view on solutions BIO-TIC can offer to accelerate market uptake of industrial biotechnology. The final aim of the project will be to draw up a blueprint document with a comprehensive set of policy recommendations for overcoming the identified innovation hurdles within a selection of European business and societal opportunities. In addition, the project will develop and market test a methodology to measure the growth of biomass use and industrial biotechnology in the market as metric to evaluate the impact of the project. Getting involved with BIO-TIC BIO-TIC will engage with all the relevant value-chain partners, promoting and facilitating active discussion groups across all industrial biotechnology sectors. A website and a partnering platform will be launched later in the year, but a BIO-TIC Linked In group is already active – open to anyone interested in the transformative potential of industrial biotechnology.
Countries
Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czechia, Germany, Denmark, Estonia, Greece, Spain, Finland, France, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Sweden, Slovenia, Slovakia, United Kingdom