Project description
A novel monitoring system for sustainability certification for biobased systems
Much like foods are labelled for contents or growing procedures, or appliances are labelled for energy efficiency, sustainability certification schemes and business-to-business labels standardise what is sustainable and to what degree. Industry and governments are moving to implement this, and the EU is supporting standardisation of certification schemes for bio-based systems to accelerate the transition to a sustainable economy. The EU-funded SUSTCERT4BIOBASED project will develop a monitoring system of bio-based products along the value chains and trades within the EU and globally. Covering four themes (environment, social, economic and governance), SUSTCERT4BIOBASED will support responsible production and consumption, and contribute to the establishment of a circular and sustainable bio-based industry.
Objective
SUSTCERT4BIOBASED project is set on fostering the adoption of effective and robust sustainability certification schemes and business-to-business labels for industrial biobased systems to support tracing the sustainability of biobased products along the value chains and trades within the EU and globally for responsible production and consumption. To this end, a monitoring system will be developed with a life-cycle perspective along four themes (environment, social, economic and governance) considering the complexity and relationships of all dimensions of sustainability and the rules and procedures on how the schemes are managed. This system will be optimized with pilot audit in practice and testing on existing schemes/labels for biobased systems evaluating their performance in the different themes and their coverage of the list of minimum requirements. Costs and benefits from the adoption of certification schemes and labels will be assessed, considering actual economic as well as internalized environmental and social ones. Data will be generated on volumes of biological resources and biobased products in global trade flow and extent of their certification. We will leverage the results of the project to provide best practices and recommendations to 4 key target groups: policy makers, sustainability system community, industrial biobased value chain actors, and regional/rural bioeconomy stakeholders. Our vision is that this will result in harmonized system requirements, continuous improvement and enhanced adoption of sustainability certification schemes and labels, and provide a significant contribution towards establishing a circular and sustainable bio-based industry for Europe contributing to the Bioeconomy Strategy and Green Deal. The large multi-sectorial stakeholders involvement (through an international Network of Interest domain and a comprehensive Advisory Board) will enable SUSTCERT4BIOBASED to increase outreach and aligning with ongoing international efforts.
Fields of science
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
HORIZON-CSA - HORIZON Coordination and Support ActionsCoordinator
6708 PB Wageningen
Netherlands