European Environment Agency, Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

The circular economy is now a widely accepted concept. It goes beyond just managing waste: it is more about keeping the value of materials high and making them last longer in their intended use. It also seeks to design unnecessary material use out of the economy. This requires new business models and a more decisive transition from ownership models to service-based solutions. A comprehensive set of new circularity policies has been introduced at EU level and there is evidence of increased circular activities in EU Member States. Developing the circular economy is a crucial part of addressing the triple planetary crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution.

European Parliament, Directorate-General for Parliamentary Research Services, Smith, E., Etienne, J., et al., European Parliament, 2024.

Alternative proteins are of increasing interest in terms of their potential to improve food security and reduce the environmental impacts of food and feed production. This study assesses the current state and future prospects of protein production globally and in the EU to 2050, with a focus on conventional and alternative protein sources for food and feed. While projections show increased conventional protein needs up to 2050, climate change necessitates exploring non-linear scenarios and the potential of alternative proteins in the global and EU protein balance.

Knowledge Centre for Bioeconomy briefs, Knowledge Centre for Bioeconomy newsletters, Community of Practice workshop reports, and other highlighted publications.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Magnolfi, V., Borzacchiello, M., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

The bioeconomy covers all sectors and systems that rely on biological resources (animals, plants, microorganisms and derived biomass, including organic waste), their functions and principles. Compiling a robust information or evidence base is an essential component of better policymaking and one of the actions of the EU Bioeconomy Strategy is to enhance information and the knowledge base on the bioeconomy, including sustainable biomass supply and demand, and forward looking, cross-sectoral assessments, and to make this information accessible through the Knowledge Centre for Bioeconomy. Data, information and knowledge related to the bioeconomy are being produced at an accelerated pace and as the amount of available knowledge increases, the more pressing becomes the need to manage this knowledge. This means that knowledge needs to be properly captured, organised, stored, shared and disseminated. In this context, the Knowledge Centre for Bioeconomy includes an online library that provides a one-stop shop for filtered and distilled knowledge on the bioeconomy to support evidence-informed EU policymaking.

European Commission: Joint Research Centre, Avitabile, V., Baldoni, E, Baruth, B., Bausano, G., Boysen-Urban, K., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2023..

The European Union (EU) uses biodmass to meet its needs for food and feed, energy, and materials. The demand and supply of biomass have environmental, social, and economic impacts. Understanding biomass supply, demand, costs, and their associated impacts is particularly important for relevant EU policy areas, to facilitate solid and evidence-based policymaking. As the European Commission's (EC) in-house science service, the role of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) is to provide EU policies with independent, evidence-based, scientific and technical support throughout the whole policy cycle, thereby contributing to coherent policies. To provide a sound scientific basis for well prepared EC policy making, the JRC was requested by Commission services to periodically provide data, processed information, models, and analysis on EU and global biomass supply and demand and its sustainability. This report is the 3rd public-facing report under this mandate.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Angileri, V., Guerrero, I., et al.., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

The core of the current Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which entered into force on 1 January 2023, is the CAP strategic plan, designed by each Member State (MS) according to a European legislative framework (Regulation EU 2021/2115). Within the strategic plans, Member States have designed interventions that best fit their needs and local conditions. The result is a wide range of tailor-made interventions across the European Union, with different requirements for farmers. To facilitate the reporting and the consequent evaluation and monitoring processes of the policy, there is a need to systematise the interventions in the CAP Strategic Plans (CSPs) according to the farming practices that are included in them. This report describes the classification scheme based on farming practices developed by the Joint Research Centre to report in a systematic way the interventions defined in the Member States CSPs and to enable the extraction and aggregation of similar interventions across different MS and different CAP areas.

European Commission, Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy, Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

This publication includes a set of examples of projects in rural areas from 23 Member States and four cross-border regions to showcase the long-lasting impact of the cohesion policy on the ground. The examples are structured around the following themes, among others: the green transition, the digital transition, social services and culture, and competitiveness. The examples have been chosen to reflect a wide thematic and geographical diversity of projects located in rural settings, including in very small towns while accounting for a variety of scales and budgets involved, from the very local interventions in a village building to national overarching strategies for rural areas. This publication complements the public report of the European Commission on the achievements of the long-term vision for the EU’s rural areas.

European Commission, Directorate-General for Research and Innovation, Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

Responding to global challenges of climate change, biodiversity loss, ecosystem degradation and increased demands from a growing population, Europe is set to transition to a sustainable, circular and carbon-neutral economy. Algae offer a sustainable means to deliver an almost endless number of valuable products including food, animal feed, nutritional supplements, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, plastics, fertilisers, biofuels and more. This CORDIS Results Pack highlights 11 innovative EU-funded projects that showcase the potential and versatility of algae production and conversion.

European Commission: Joint Research Centre and Parisi, C., Publications Office, 2020.

The EU bio-based industry is quickly evolving but clear data on the development of this emerging sector are still missing. This document illustrates the work of the JRC in building an extensive database of EU facilities producing different categories of bio-based products: chemicals, liquid biofuels, composites and fibres, biomethane, pulp&paper, sugar, starch and timber. The database is accompanied by an online interactive dashboard for visualisation of its content in which the user is invited to apply the available filters (product category, feedstock origin, TRL and country) to discover the EU bio-based sector. An additional filter is also provided to identify EU biorefineries, according to the user’s preferred definition of them.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Melim-McLeod, C., Patani, S., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

This document describes the progress made in 2023 for the development and operational updating of the EU Bioeconomy Monitoring System. It contains an overview of the purpose of the system, its current status and future outlook for 2024. Technical details of the back-end and front-end are also provided. This is the fourth of an annual reporting scheme to document and inform the public of the progress in building the EU Bioeconomy Monitoring System.

European Commission: Joint Research Centre, Sanchez-Jerez, P., Raftoyannis, Y., Riihimäki, M. and Mubareka, S., Publications Office of the European Union, 2023.

The conceptual framework of the EU Bioeconomy Monitoring System was designed to assess the EU’s progress towards a circular and sustainable bioeconomy. Indicators were selected to cover the various parts of the framework but gaps in the knowledge or data still exist. This document describes the progress made in filling gaps in the indicators that had been identified as being important to understand the progress of the EU Bioeconomy. In 2022, three gaps were addressed: Climate change adaptation in fisheries and aquaculture, climate change adaptation in forestry and share of wood in construction. Indicators of adaptation to climate change in fisheries and aquaculture presented in Chapter 2 of this report are chosen for their ability to indicate changes in these sectors either as technical changes, changes in the behaviour of resource users/producers, or changes in the governance system.

European Commission: Joint Research Centre, Gurría, P., González Hermoso, H., Cazzaniga, N., Jasinevicius, G. et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2022.

The EU Biomass Flows tool is a visualisation, in the form of Sankey diagrams, of the flows of biomass for each sector of the bioeconomy, from supply to uses including trade. It displays the harmonised data from the various Joint Research Centre (JRC) units contributing to the BIOMASS Assessment study of the JRC3. The diagrams enable deeper analysis and comparison of the different countries and sectors across a defined time series. The first version of the tool was published in 2017 and has been used in multiple research activities and publications. A new version was released in 2020 on new software.

European Commission, Directorate-General for Research and Innovation, Publications Office of the European Union, 2022.

The updated EU Bioeconomy Strategy from 2018 “A sustainable Bioeconomy for Europe: Strengthening the connection between economy, society and the environment” provides the policy frame for the deployment of a circular and sustainable bioeconomy in Europe. In November 2019, the Council of the European Union adopted conclusions on the 2018 EU Bioeconomy Strategy, calling upon the EC to deliver a Bioeconomy Strategy Progress Report by 2022. In response to this, the European Commission developed the Progress Report “European Bioeconomy Policy: Stocktaking and future developments”. The report: Outlines the state of play of the European Bioeconomy and assess the progress in the implementation of the 2018 EU Bioeconomy Strategy and its Action Plan. Identifies the gaps and future opportunities of the bioeconomy policy, in light of recent policy developments under the European Green Deal.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Turóczy, Z., Borzacchiello, M., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

In 2022 and 2023, the European Commission’s Knowledge Centre for Bioeconomy organised three workshops to explore bioeconomy foresight scenarios developed in 2020. With the help of a scientific game and foresight tool called the Scenario Exploration System, stakeholders in various bioeconomy sectors were involved in a role playing exercise involving highly interactive discussions. During the workshops, participants were prompted to develop forward-looking and strategic thinking about the bioeconomy. In particular, they were invited to reflect on aspects such as the role of different actors in leveraging the unique features of the bioeconomy and its contribution to the European Green Deal, a bioeconomy that is inclusive of left-behind regions and how to engage citizens in adopting lifestyles that contribute to a sustainable and just green transition.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Giuntoli, J., Ramcilovic-Suominen, S., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2023.

The Bioeconomy is both an enabler and an end for the European Green Deal transformation: achieving the EGD transformation entails transforming the very meaning of sustainable bioeconomy. Among the deepest and most effective leverage points to transform a system are the worldviews driving our behaviours: they yield an enormous power to influence the framings which determine the solution space we explore. Transforming the bioeconomy, thus, requires reflecting on the stories we tell about ourselves, our place in nature, and our relationship with others.

European Parliament, Directorate-General for Parliamentary Research Services, Breuil, G., Diafas, I., et al., European Parliament, 2024.

The European Green Deal, aimed at making the EU climate-neutral by 2050, outlines a comprehensive approach to sustainability, requiring profound transformation across all industrial sectors. Horizon Europe, the EU's foremost research and innovation programme, can be a critical enabler, providing the necessary funding, framework and innovation pathways to support this transition. Employing a combination of desk research and stakeholder consultations, this study evaluates Horizon Europe's alignment with the Green Deal, focusing specifically on Horizon's impact on European industry.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Wydra, S., Ronzon, T., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

The innovation in the bioeconomy sectors is a key enabler for transitioning towards a carbon-neutral economy and complying with the objectives of the EU’s Bioeconomy Strategy. Consequently, the EU-Bioeconomy Monitoring System places significant emphasis on indicators of research and innovation activities in the bioeconomy sectors, and some placeholders within this field were foreseen in its current structure. In order to retrieve relevant data on bioeconomy innovation and make methodological choices, the Joint Research Centre (JRC) contracted recognized experts in the field. The experts assessed the feasibility of implementing the planned indicators and proposed complementary ones. This report presents the results of the experts' analysis of the evaluation of the indicators foreseen in the EU-Bioeconomy Monitoring System, and offers an operational description of the methodologies to retrieve, transform, and display data for research and innovation in the bioeconomy sectors.

European Commission, European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency, Van de Velde, E., Kretz, D., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

Measuring performance and monitoring change within an industrial ecosystem are vital components that enable policymakers and industry stakeholders to track progress over time and obtain valuable feedback on whether the system is moving in the desired direction. This report is a contribution to the ‘European Monitor of Industrial Ecosystems’ (EMI) project, initiated by the European Commission's Directorate General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship, and SMEs, in partnership with the European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA). Its primary objective is to present the current state and the advancements achieved over time in terms of the green and digital transition of the Agri-Food Industrial Ecosystem.

European Commission, Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development, Münch, A., Gorny, H., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

This study on funding for EU rural areas assesses the role of the CAP 2014-2022 in addressing needs and actions outlined under the EU’s Long-term vision for rural areas (LTVRA) in Europe. This role is considered in the context of Member States’ strategic frameworks, plans or other policies for rural areas. The study also assesses the specific role of the CAP alongside those of other EU funds targeting rural areas (2014-2020), primarily ERDF/CF, ESF and EMFF, and national funds. The study addresses seven evaluation study questions covering three criteria: effectiveness, relevance, and coherence, with most emphasis upon analysis of relevance and coherence. It finds that while the LTVRA covers very diverse needs, they are well targeted by CAP, often through bottom-up approaches and small-scale delivery that reflect regional and local variation in challenges and opportunities.

European Commission, Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture, Ranalli, M., Sala Pérez, M., et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

Publication metadata
This study investigates the potential role of a Knowledge and Innovation Community (KIC) in Water, Marine, and Maritime Sectors and Ecosystems (WMM) under the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT). The research addresses 1) the current challenges in WMM; 2) assessing scientific, technological, and socio-economic developments since 2019; and 3) synergies with existing initiatives. The analysis reveals persisting challenges such as water scarcity, flood risks and marine and freshwater ecosystem degradation as a result of extreme conditions enhanced by climate change, and the need for a circular and sustainable blue economy. Scientific advancements and policy efforts are acknowledged, yet persistent challenges require coordinated action among all stakeholders.

European Commission, Eurostat, Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

The EU is fully committed to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), adopted by the United Nations in September 2015. Eurostat monitors the EU’s progress towards the SDGs along a set of 102 indicators. The EU indicator set has been carefully selected in cooperation with a large number of stakeholders based on criteria of statistical quality and relevance in an EU policy context. The indicators are assessed annually over both a short-term (past five years of available data) and a long-term (15-year) period. This report is the eighth in the series. It also looks at the impact of some recent developments in the SDGs based on quarterly and monthly data. In addition, it includes a section on the EU in the world and the spillover effects of EU consumption.

European Committee of the Regions, Commission for Natural Resources, Marcinkowska, I., Maj, A., European Committee of the Regions, 2024.

This study analyses the role of tourism in rural development. It explores the challenges and opportunities for public authorities interested in boosting their rural tourism profiles and making tourism an effective tool for rural development. The study highlights the relationship between the long-term vision for rural areas and tourism policy and describes how to access funds to support such policy developments. It provides a review of good practice examples and evaluates their scalability and potential for reproduction in other regions across the EU.

European Commission: Joint Research Centre, Mubareka, S., Giuntoli, J., Sanchez Lopez, J., Lasarte Lopez, J. et al., Publications Office of the European Union, 2023.

Policy monitoring frameworks allow decision makers to assess the performance and progress towards specific strategic objectives that reflect an overall vision. The bioeconomy consists of complex social, economic, and environmental systems. The EU Bioeconomy Monitoring System was developed by the JRC to fulfil the need for a holistic policy monitoring framework and track economic, environmental and social progress towards a sustainable bioeconomy through relevant indicators. Here we present the first assessment based on the EU Bioeconomy Monitoring System.

European Commission, Directorate-General for Energy, Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

The Governance Regulation sets out the legal requirements and specific content for Member States (MSs) to report to the EC on the five dimensions of the Energy Union, including when to report and templates for the reports, which are further detailed in Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/2299 of 15 November 2022. The NECPRs submitted in the 2023 round were the first NECPRs with the new and updated formats, containing the requests as stated in the Governance Regulation. In this report, we present the main findings of the quantitative and qualitative analysis regarding the production and consumption of bioenergy in each MS and in the European Union (EU-27) as a whole, as well as the main policies and measures implemented.

European Commission, Directorate-General for Energy, Publications Office of the European Union, 2024.

The Governance Regulation sets out the legal requirements and specific content for Member States (MSs) to report to the EC on the five dimensions of the Energy Union, including when to report and templates for the reports, which are further detailed in Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/2299 of 15 November 2022. The NECPRs submitted in the 2023 round were the first NECPRs with the new and updated formats, containing the requests as stated in the Governance Regulation. In this report, we present the main findings of the quantitative and qualitative analysis regarding the production and consumption of bioenergy in each MS and in the European Union (EU-27) as a whole, as well as the main policies and measures implemented.