The bioeconomy, which uses renewable biological resources and technologies to produce food, materials, or energy, can play a crucial role in shaping structural change. It has the potential to create new value networks, thereby promoting knowledge-based growth and jobs, ecosystem revitalisation and resilience, resource efficiency and circularity, and innovation, while taking into account the context-specific economic, social and environmental conditions of a region. However, regional stakeholders seeking to unlock this transition potential of the bioeconomy often lack the necessary operational know-how, frameworks and financial support.
Driven by the shift towards sustainable development, regions with carbon-intensive economies, such as coal mining, intensive agriculture, forestry, fisheries and peat production, are undergoing significant structural change. The negative impacts can be severe, including economic disruption, unemployment, social strain, and regional inequalities.
BIO2REG is a three-year European project that aims to enable the systemic transformation of greenhouse gas-intensive regions into bioeconomy model regions. Nine partners are committed to developing concrete measures to enable sustainable bioeconomic transitions in European regions.
