Monday, 12 April 2021 11:35

Boost to the blue bioeconomy

Written by Frederick Bruce, SUBMARINER Network for Blue Growth EEIG

The Better Off Blue online event series is a collaborative effort between three Interreg Baltic Sea Region projects (GRASS, Alliance+ and Blue Platform), spearheaded by the SUBMARINER Network for Blue Growth.

Several projects under the Horizon2020 are coming to an end, of which most have a requirement for a final conference to disseminate the results of those projects. With the second Better Off Blue event series having been postponed due to COVID-19 and the need to move meetings online, it made sense to combine these final conferences with the Better Off Blue framework.

As the newest member of the SUBMARINER Network Secretariat, I have been hugely impressed by the participation in the events. Highlights so far have been the funding roundtable which placed representatives from different public funding bodies such as DGMARE in the same room for the first time. The Alliance+ business matchmaking event was also a great success with some really exciting new start-ups and scale-ups from health foods to biorefinery to environmental remediation services. The upcoming events for technology transfer and macroalgae should be even better, and I recommend anyone and everyone to get involved, even if your industry is not traditionally related to the blue bioeconomy., there is potential for crossover and collaboration in the most unlikely of places, be it bioplastics, textiles, water treatment or agricultural and industrial symbioses.

Frederick Bruce, Junior Consultant at SUBMARINER

The Better Off Blue event series is intended to showcase all of the blue bioeconomy focus areas of the SUBMARINER Network and address the demands voiced by its members and partners such as matchmaking, mapping of legislation, stakeholder identification or project proposals. The ultimate goal of the event series is to foster collaboration and innovation in a transnational, multi-business, circular bioeconomy network.

It will:

Facilitate active discussions on the State of Play of the Baltic Blue Bioeconomy 2021, focusing on questions such as ‘What has been achieved?’; ‘What are the new issues we now have to tackle?’ and ‘What can and should be done to bring the Baltic Blue Bioeconomy to the next level?’
Present and gather feedback on the ‘Baltic Blue Bioeconomy Roadmap 2021-2030’ (developed under the Blue Platform project)
Bring together the various stakeholder groups to go above and beyond project-level and sector thinking – all events will foster transdisciplinary interaction
Integrate the sustainability triad of environmental, social and economic considerations into the Baltic Blue Bioeconomy
Showcase and strengthen Baltic Blue Bioeconomy's common goals and partnerships within the context of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals; the Decade for Ocean Science; the European Green Deal; Farm to Fork; Biodiversity Strategies; the EU4Ocean initiative; the HELCOM Baltic Sea Action Plan and many more.

Why should you join?

The event series will bring together a wide range of actors from across Blue Bioeconomy sectors, including those from the public, private and research domain throughout the Baltic Sea Region to showcase advances, create synergies and stimulate active cooperation between the multitude of ongoing projects and initiatives in the region. Actors include but are not limited to:

Policy-makers: including EU, Baltic as well as national and regional
Academia: including universities and research institutions
Industry: including large-scale companies as well as SMEs, start-ups, practitioners, entrepreneurs, micro-companies, business support organisations and clusters
NGOs: including EU, Baltic level as well as smaller organisations
Youth: including students and young change-makers
General public