Towards sustainable bioeconomy guidelines
Bioeconomy comprises the parts of the economy that use renewable biological resources (plants, animals, micro-organisms, etc.) to replace fossil fuels, and produce food, animal feed, and other biobasedproducts. Its cross-cutting nature offers a unique opportunity to comprehensively address interconnected societal challenges such as food security, natural resource scarcity, fossil-resource dependence and climate change, while achieving sustainable economic development. As bioeconomyplays an increasingly important role in many countries and regions, it is crucial to establish guidelines that enable it to be developed in a sustainable way.
Goal
The project aims to develop sustainable bioeconomy guidelines to assists countries and bioeconomy operators in developing and implementing national and regional sustainable bioeconomy strategies, policies and programmes.Impact
The project supports the decoupling of growth and development from the use of fossil fuels. This reduces greenhouse gas emissions, and enhances food security and agricultural development. In addition, local biomass transformation has the potential to generate employment and value added to rural areas. Finally, the synergies created among innovative rural employment programmes, gender-sensitive responses to climate change and green growth strategies contribute greatly to sustainable and equitable development.Approach
A two-phased stepwise programme, “Bioeconomythat Works for People, Food Security and Climate Change”, has been established to assist member countries in developing sustainable bioeconomyin a systematic and targeted way. This project is the second phase, which is based on an evaluation of the successful results of Phase I, implemented in 2015-16. It covers outreach activities through a series of consultations and dialogues involving members of all relevant stakeholder groups. The outputs of the project include:
- a report on lessons learned from a selection of good bioeconomyexamples;
- a compilation of agreed good bioeconomypractices;
- a report on policies that promote the implementation of good bioeconomypractices;
- a ‘toolbox’ on sustainable bioeconomydevelopment;
- agreed indicators to monitor and evaluate impacts and performance of bioeconomy;
- validation of sustainable bioeconomyguidelines through regional and specific stakeholder meetings.