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The origins of this book, being the first in the new series on , date from the early projects and common synergies that Lucio de Sousa and I started respectively in Japan and China. The GECEM project, funded by the ERC, and the Global History Network in China (GHN) has contributed with no doubt to embark on such new project to better understand the disparities between East Asia, mainly China and Japan, and the West. The use of new empirical evidence and cross referencing Western and Eastern sources is a paramount element to reframe the debate of the great divergence and the new directions of global history. New case studies and new questions are crucial to overcome in the West the harsh critics to global history, the so-called Eurocentric exceptionalism, but also to outdo the prevailing Sinocentric focus regarding China studies. This project places a special emphasis on the polycentric economic areas of the world, not only from China, Japan and Europe, but also the Americas. Therefore, the ultimate aim is to analyse economic growth from a local to a global perspective without repeatedly making emphasis in core areas that traditional historiography has done in the past to praise national histories.

Feeding a growing population is one of the major challenges of the twenty-first century. However, 200 years ago, it was this very same challenge that initiated the foundation of the University of Hohenheim in 1818. Three years earlier, in 1815, the volcano Tambora erupted in Indonesia. This local geological event had tremendous impact on the global climate. The eruption ejected huge quantities of ash into the atmosphere, causing two ‘summers without sun’. In Europe, lower temperatures led to poor crop growth, resulting in famine and riots. On 20 November 1818, King Wilhelm I of Württemberg founded an agricultural education and research station at Hohenheim, with the aim of contributing to regional food security by educating farmers and developing better agricultural production methods.

The future bioeconomy is expected to drive the transition towards a more sustainable economy by addressing some of the major global challenges, including food security, climate change and resource scarcity. The globally increasing demand for food in particular, but also materials and renewable energy, necessitates innovative developments in the primary sectors. Innovations will need to generate more resource-use-efficient technologies and methods for increasing productivity in agriculture, forestry and aquaculture without jeopardizing the Earth’s carrying capacity and biodiversity. The bioeconomy exploits new resources by building on renewable biomass. Through this, the introduction of innovative and resource-use-efficient production technologies and the transition to a sustainable society, it helps to substitute or reduce the use of limited fossil resources, thereby contributing to climate change mitigation.

This chapter consists of three sections. The first section deals with the origin and evolution of the concept of the bioeconomy. It starts by tracing the first uses of the terms bioeconomics and bioeconomy and goes on to review the development of the concept of the “knowledge-based bioeconomy” in the European Union before discussing the rise of the bioeconomy as a global concept. A shift from a “resource substitution perspective” of the bioeconomy to a “biotechnology innovation perspective” is identified. Critical views of the bioeconomy are discussed, distinguishing a “fundamental critique” and a “greenwashing critique” of the bioeconomy. The first section of this chapter also reviews the relations between the concept of the bioeconomy and the concepts of “sustainable development”, “green economy”, “circular economy” and “societal transformation”. The second section of the chapter discusses the bioeconomy strategies that an increasing number of countries around the world have adopted in recent years. This section uses a competitiveness framework to classify different elements of the bioeconomy strategies. The third section of the chapter is concerned with bioeconomy governance, focusing on the different actors in the bioeconomy, the ways in which they interact and the governance challenges that they are confronted with.

In this chapter, characteristics and definitions of inter- and transdisciplinary research are presented and discussed with specific attention to bioeconomy-related policy discourses, concepts and production examples. Inter- and transdisciplinary research approaches have the potential to positively contribute to solving complex societal problems and to advance the generation of knowledge relevant for innovative solutions. As a key concept for integrating different disciplines across social and natural sciences within a common research project, we present principles, models and examples of system research and highlight systems practice with the help of the farming systems and the socioecological systems approaches. Next, we concretise inter- and transdisciplinary research practice as a three-phase process and operationalise cooperation of scientists and stakeholders in bioeconomy contexts. Specific attention is given to a differentiated understanding of knowledge. The chapter is closed with a reflection on the role researchers play in inter- and transdisciplinary research and the impacts created by norms and values emanating from science.

The bioeconomy uses the resources biomass—originating directly or indirectly from plants, microorganisms, or animals—and biological knowledge. A bioeconomist requires knowledge of these resources to be able to plan the resource supply strategy for a bioeconomic activity, to decide which biomass resource is best suited for a specific biobased product chain and how these product chains can be optimized. This chapter describes the characteristics of biomass, important technologies for the designing of these characteristics, and the use of data and biological knowledge.

In the second part of the chapter, the concept of biobased value chains and their integration into value nets is addressed. Examples of value chains from food, bioenergy, biomaterial, and biochemical applications are used to demonstrate how biomass is integrated into different biobased product chains.

Agricultural Production: Agriculture is the cultivation of crops or the husbandry of livestock in pure or integrated crop/animal production systems for the main purpose of food production, but also for the provision of biomass for material and energetic use. Together with forestry, agricultural production represents the main activity of resource production and supply in the bioeconomy and the major activity delivering food as well as starch, sugar and vegetable oil resources. Today, 33% (about 4900 Mha) of the Earth’s land surface is used for agricultural production, providing a living for 2.5 billion people. Agriculture shapes cultural landscapes but, at the same time, is associated with degradation of land and water resources and deterioration of related ecosystem goods and services, is made responsible for biodiversity losses and accounts for 13.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions (IPCC ).

In the future bioeconomy, agriculture needs to be performed sustainably. ‘Sustainable intensification’ aims at shaping agricultural production in such a way that sufficient food and biomass can be produced for a growing population while, at the same time, maintaining ecosystem functions and biodiversity. Sustainable intensification can partly be achieved by the development and implementation of innovative production technologies, which allow a more efficient use of natural resources, including land and agricultural inputs. Its implementation requires a knowledge-based approach, in which farmers are made aware of the requirements of sustainable production and trained in the implementation of sustainable agricultural production systems.

The planning of bio-based value chains and sustainable bioeconomic development demands an understanding of the mechanisms of biomass production and supply (as described in this chapter) for the entire global agricultural sector.

Forestry: Forests cover about 30% of the Earth’s total land area, harbouring most of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity and containing almost as much carbon as the atmosphere. They have many functions, providing livelihoods for more than a billion people, and are of high relevance for biodiversity conservation, soil and water protection, supply of wood for energy, construction and other applications, as well as other bio-based resources and materials such as food and feed. The forestry sector was the first to adopt a sustainability concept (cf. Carlowitz), and sustainable use and management of forestry remains an important issue to this day. Forestry is a multifunctional bioeconomic system and has an important function in securing the sustainable resource base for the present and future bioeconomy.

Aquatic Animal Production: Aquatic animals are fundamental to a well-balanced, healthy human diet due to their profile and content of essential amino acids, polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamins and minerals. Since the 1990s, the growing demand for aquatic food cannot be satisfied by capture fisheries alone and has therefore caused a steady increase in aquaculture production of on average 8.8% annually. Today aquaculture is the fastest-growing agricultural sector globally, especially in Asia. There are 18.7 million fish farmers globally, and annual aquaculture production is worth around 150 billion euros. It is expected that aquaculture will increasingly contribute to protein supply and healthy nutrition of the growing world population.

Fish production can be performed at different intensity levels, from production systems based on natural feed resources to closed systems in ponds or tanks which fully rely on external feed. New integrated aquaculture systems are increasingly being developed and applied, which follow a more direct implementation of a circular bioeconomy and focus on a more efficient use of nutrients and water. The best choice of production method largely depends on local conditions.

Microalgae: Microalgae are one of the most important global biomass producers and can be used commercially to produce specific food, feed and biochemical compounds. The cultivation process differs completely from that of land-based plants because they are grown under more or less controlled conditions in different types of bioreactor systems in salt, brackish or fresh water. Special processing requirements apply to the extraction of valuable compounds from algae biomass and further use of the residual biomass, especially in cascade utilization. In general, the chemical characteristics and market specifications, for example the required degree of product purity, determine the downstream processing technique. Additional requirements are the avoidance of an energy-intensive drying step wherever possible and the ensuring of gentle extraction processes that both maintain the functionality of biochemical compounds and permit the extraction of further cell components.

The vast number of microalgae strains differ fundamentally in cell size, cell wall formation and biomass composition. By applying successive extraction procedures, both the principal fractions (e.g. proteins, polar membrane lipids with omega-3 fatty acids, non-polar triacylglycerides) as well as high-value components such as carotenoids can be obtained sequentially from the microalgae biomass.

Economics of Primary Production: When developing new bio-based products and assessing their market opportunities, the correct calculation of all expected unit costs is indispensable. The provision of natural resources from primary agricultural or forest production is an important cost component in this calculation. All renewable natural resources require a certain time to grow. For this reason, in order to correctly account for all external and internal net benefits of natural resources, it is important to calculate the related capital costs and model the biological growth over time. For permanent crops and woodland resources, it is particularly important to derive optimized single and infinite rotations for different kinds of plantations. For this purpose, the corresponding biological growth expectations need to be combined with an investment appraisal. This chapter introduces basic concepts dealing with interest calculation based on the existence of (economic) capital growth and biological growth.

Food Processing: Food science and technology is the science that deals with the physical, biological, and chemical processes relevant for the processing of food and food ingredients. The goal is to research, develop, and optimize technical procedures based on natural and engineering sciences as well as socioeconomic factors in order to provide high-quality and safe food for human consumption. Food processing refers to the conversion/transformation of raw materials to a safe food product. This chapter introduces the physical, chemical, and biological unit operations typically used in food processing to ensure food safety and quality. The influence of intrinsic as well as extrinsic parameters on microbial growth behavior is highlighted and examples of important factors that need to be considered during food processing are introduced (water activity, enzyme activity, lipid oxidation). At the end of the chapter, strategies for new product developments are also presented.

Biotechnological Conversion: This chapter presents key terms and concepts in the field of industrial biotechnology. The inclusion of examples, such as ethanol fermentation, and production of polylactic acid (PLA) and propanediol (PDO), allows students to become acquainted with important concepts and their application. Industrial biotechnology, also known as “white biotechnology,” is devoted to the exploitation of living cells, such as yeasts, molds, bacteria, and enzymes. In the context of a bioeconomy, it may provide methods to replace and complement petroleum-based synthetics. Industrial biotechnology has been identified as a key enabling technology. Nowadays, industrial biochemicals are mainly produced from carbon sources based on sucrose and glucose. In a future bioeconomy, lignocellulosic plant biomass could become a key feedstock. However, for this purpose, technologies are required that can break down lignocellulosic biomass more easily, with less energy input, and creating less waste than is presently the case. The rapid development of genetic, synthetic biology and bioprocessing methods will lead to biotechnology increasingly complementing chemical industries.

Thermochemical Conversion: All thermochemical conversions help to overcome two main hurdles in the bioeconomy: the high oxygen content of biomass (low heating value if used as fuel) and the large variability in biomass composition and characteristics. In addition, all thermochemical conversions have in common that they can produce platform chemicals, materials, or fuels from a wide range of biomass types, and that the oxygen content is lower in the product than in the feedstock. The bioeconomy is not only a concept, but also requires technologies that are attractive enough for companies to put into practice, thus creating the technological base for a large-scale use of biomass.

For the substitution of fossil resources by biomass, new technologies are needed. In this chapter, students learn how biomass is converted by (thermo-)chemical conversion technologies to energy carriers or platform chemicals. One example is the conversion of chicory roots to the platform chemical hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF). After further chemical conversion, HMF can be used to produce a wide range of common objects from daily life, including bottles and stockings. Thermal conversion can also be applied to produce special carbon materials, e.g., supercapacitors, which will enable a more flexible use of e-cars.

Process and Product Cost Assessment: When a new product or process is developed and introduced, market analyses and cost estimates are required to examine its marketability and manufacturing or production costs. Before a company takes the decision to construct a production plant and invest in the production and marketing of a certain product, it needs to make sure that the planned process is the most economical and thus the most profitable alternative. In order to make this decision in a sound manner, various tools are used to carry out an economic assessment, weighing up the different costs and revenues against each other. Profitability considerations are also used to develop business plans and assess the state and value of a company. When decisions to invest in chemical conversion plants are taken, a large number of factors have to be taken into account. Hard factors such as profitability and amortization time are important to outline the investment opportunity. However, they are not sufficient to fully characterize the process and thus correctly assess the investment potential. Soft factors also need to be considered in order to weight up further advantages and disadvantages of an investment. These include a number of criteria relating to the technical process, the location of the production plant, and the market situation. Production costs are strongly influenced by the technology applied along with its materials and energy balance. Therefore, process and product cost analysis takes place in early stages and during process engineering. The resulting economic data allow an economic analysis and the creation of a business plan, which help to determine whether a planned project is profitable or not. This chapter provides the fundamental knowledge for this process, together with an example of a cost estimation.

Markets of Biobased Resources and Products: This chapter takes a closer look at the global market for biobased products and resources and its interactions with agricultural and food markets. In particular, it describes the effect of increasing demand for biobased products on market prices and thus the quantity of agricultural resources demanded and supplied. Furthermore, we discuss factors that may drive or limit demand and supply of biobased products. We analyse the market for biobased resources and products, considering products that are already established in the market, such as biofuels, as well as products that could acquire a substantial market acceptance in the future, such as bio-plastics. In addition, we briefly introduce selected policy instruments applied to support biobased products.

The chapter provides a simple example of a perfectly competitive market for biobased products to introduce the market model. It starts by presenting the supply and demand curves and discussing the differences between price changes and those of other determinants of supply and demand with respect to their effects on the respective curve. It then explains how the supply and demand curves jointly determine the equilibrium price and quantity on the market and how the market price regulates surpluses and shortages under the assumption of an autarkic country. We apply this market model to demonstrate the effect of one particular policy for promoting the production of biobased products on the equilibrium market price and quantity.

Sustainable Development and Sustainability Management: In the last decade(s), the idea of sustainable development has become a widely acknowledged topic which is supported by many actors in modern society.

Companies, as central economic players, are increasingly pressured by a wide set of stakeholders to engage in sustainability management and to contribute their share towards sustainability. Against this background, this chapter first introduces the general idea of sustainable development with its elements of intragenerational and intergenerational justice and illustrates the roots of sustainable development as a normative-anthropocentric concept. Since sustainability is a contested idea with many different notions, the different understandings of weak, strong and quasi-sustainability are introduced and the status quo of sustainability in society is highlighted.

Following this general introduction, actors of sustainability in society are named and the relevance of sustainability management for companies is discussed. In the remainder of this chapter, three base strategies to achieve sustainability (i.e. eco-efficiency, eco-effectiveness and sufficiency) are explained along with their opportunities and limitations in achieving sustainability. Finally, some exemplary elements and tools of sustainability management from the areas of sustainability accounting and management control as well as of sustainable supply chain management are introduced to provide a first glimpse of possibilities for companies to engage with sustainability.

Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment: The bioeconomy is based on the three pillars of sustainability and aims to balance the environmental, economic and social aspects. For this task, tools are required that provide qualitative and quantitative information on the environmental, economic and social performance of biobased products and on the trade-offs between the goals of the three dimensions of sustainability. In this chapter, a methodological approach for a Sustainability Assessment based on ‘Life-Cycle Thinking’ is presented. This approach combines the use of three forms of assessment: Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) for the environmental aspects, Life-Cycle Costing (LCC) for the economic aspects and Social Life-Cycle Assessment (sLCA) for the social aspects. Together these form the most comprehensive methodology for sustainability assessment: Life-Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA). A hypothetical example of an LCSA is elaborated for a biobased product to illustrate the different assessment steps.

Entrepreneurial Ventures and the Bioeconomy: Entrepreneurship is based on entrepreneurial opportunities and the bioeconomy offers a plethora of such opportunities. As the bioeconomy—at least partially—addresses humanity’s greatest challenges, it consequently offers the greatest entrepreneurial opportunities as well. One useful tool to break down the idea generation process and manage the entrepreneurial process is the business model canvas, which makes it possible to clearly describe the value proposition of a new venture in the bioeconomy. The lean start-up approach can help entrepreneurs in the bioeconomy to move efficiently through the entrepreneurial process and to quickly develop a value proposition and a validated business model.

The strategy of using biogenic resources in a bioeconomy could be seen as one answer to the geopolitical challenges the world is facing in the twenty-first century. One of those challenges is the closing of the prosperity gap between rich and poor countries. However, considering the current global population growth and anthropogenically induced climate change, it is expected that efforts to achieve this goal will be accompanied by an increasing demand for food, feed, products, and energy, which cannot be satisfied by the expected supply of non-biogenic raw materials and resources.

Transforming an economy is extremely complex: domestic and international obligations, traditional practices, and divergent interests and wishes need to be taken into consideration. This requires the development of an appropriate strategy and adequate instruments and tools to support it.

This chapter discusses a range of possible knowledge-based instruments and tools that take a systemic view of the challenges in such transformation processes.