EU has the Ingredients to a Thriving Bioeconomy – But a New Recipe is Urgently Needed

A thriving bioeconomy can do a lot to boost the EU’s self-sufficiency and competitiveness, while helping to tackle climate change. To make this happen, we need to shift focus from individual technologies to entire value chains. This way, we can ensure the sustainable use of wood and other biomass, and get consumers and businesses on board.

There are already several innovative startups turning sugars into valuable chemicals and food components with the help of microbes and nutrients. No wonder biotechnology is often presented as the key element of the European bioeconomy. As a biotechnologist, I can easily share the excitement. But I’m worried about an intense focus on a single technology as the main solution. I’m afraid it may affect the direction the new Bioeconomy Strategy will take when it's drafted later this year.

To build a thriving bioeconomy, we must take into account all the relevant technologies, not just the high-profile ones. I expect the winning bioeconomy concepts to make use of both new and established technologies. Most importantly, we need to create and develop entire value chains and added value within the EU. We need to make sure that our biomass resources – from forests, fields, and seas – are used optimally to produce food as well as materials, chemicals, and other bio-based products. 

To build a thriving bioeconomy, we must take into account all the relevant technologies, not just the high-profile ones.

When done right, the bioeconomy can help address major challenges the EU is facing today. It will reduce fossil imports and the volume of the fossil economy while increasing bio-based self-sufficiency. It will help tackle climate change while boosting sustainable business growth. A thriving bioeconomy will help the EU to take a significant leap in global competitiveness.

Forests – an important biomass resource for value-added products 

Forests serve multiple purposes. We want them to act as efficient carbon sinks and to provide raw materials, biodiversity and other ecosystem services. Since these goals sometimes conflict, we need to make sure that trees are always harvested for a good reason – to fight the fossil economy.

Harvested wood should be used to make products that either act as long-term carbon storages, like furniture or buildings, or replace fossil-based alternatives, like plastics, packaging materials or synthetic textile fibres. At the same time, we need to adopt the best forest management practices to ensure that forests play their role as carbon sinks in climate change mitigation and provide habitats for biodiversity. 

We need to make sure that trees are always harvested for a good reason – to fight the fossil economy.

In the forest industry, it’s not just wood that is valuable as raw material. Biogenic CO₂ can be captured from pulp mills and combined with green hydrogen to produce raw materials for chemicals or liquid fuels. This is why the Clean Industrial Deal in the 2025 Commission Work Programme should have strong ties to the Bioeconomy Strategy.

We need to make sure European pulp is increasingly processed into value-added products in Europe rather than shipped overseas. To achieve this, EU funding should prioritize research, development, and innovation that creates and strengthens strong research ecosystems and creates investment opportunities within the EU.

Ensuring the sustainability of the forest-based bioeconomy 

At the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke), we work across entire value chains with a special focus on the first part, i.e. biomass production and supply. For decades, we’ve been researching boreal forests from soil to treetops and developing different forest management practices.

Research is needed to develop closer-to-nature forest management concepts and tools and to improve the resilience of our forests to future climate conditions

A sustainable biomass supply is essential for the bioeconomy, and research is needed to develop closer-to-nature forest management concepts and tools and to improve the resilience of our forests to future climate conditions. One example of well-functioning tools is genome-based breeding which is being used and constantly developed to increase forest growth and resilience. New monitoring tools are also needed for biodiversity management which is a significant part of sustainable forestry.

Strengthening value chains in Europe

It’s easy to say we need to process our valuable biomass into sustainable, high-value products in Europe. But how do we prioritize raw materials, manufacturing processes, and products? We need to develop our value chains systematically, which requires gathering and analyzing vast amounts of data.

My colleagues at Luke are experts in this field, specializing in value chain analysis. They assess impacts of the bioeconomy and compare them to those of the fossil economy from multiple perspectives, including climate change, biodiversity, and national economies.

We need these analytics experts – and their peers across the EU – more than ever. With their help, we can focus on entire value chains and make the European bioeconomy thrive.