Innovation in the bioeconomy: Perspectives of entrepreneurs on relevant framework conditions

Kerstin Wilde,Frans Hermans

doi:10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.127979

Abstract

Although entrepreneurial activities are of key importance in a properly functioning innovation system, the micro level of actors is often neglected in the innovation systems' literature. The goal of this paper is to show how the configuration of innovation systems shapes entrepreneurs' perceptions and behaviors. The originality of the present article rests upon a novel framework that distinguishes between the willingness, capability, and perceived opportunities of entrepreneurs embedded in specific innovation systems. We explore the perceptions of 30 entrepreneurs from two European bioeconomy cluster regions who are engaged in R&D and collaborative experimentation in the chemical, plastics, and construction materials industries. Our findings show that with documented innovation willingness, entrepreneurs' innovation capacity is not the decisive bottleneck. Rather, bioeconomy actors perceive that innovation opportunities are blocked by institutions at the national and international levels. The configuration of relevant sectoral innovation systems and value-chains is crucial. We conclude that bioeconomy promotion should emphasis the demand side and systemic multi-level policies that address innovation barriers with due consideration for industry-specific innovation systems and value-chain configurations.

Highlights

Major environmental, social, and economic challenges have led to the claim that Europe must radically change its approach to production, consumption, processing, storage, recycling and disposal of biological resources (EC, 2012)
The exploration of two European cluster regions, where substantial public and private resources were invested during several years of R&D and innovation efforts geared towards advancing a bioeconomy, revealed no case of a company replacing fossil with bio-based feedstocks: the companies that used fossil inputs since their establish ment continued to do so routinely
The following results are exclusively focused on innovation barriers—that is, hurdles perceived by entrepreneurs as preventing them from building upon new knowledge, technologies, or partners and effect the use, application, and market-based exploitation of their learning

Summary

Introduction

Social, and economic challenges have led to the claim that Europe must radically change its approach to production, consumption, processing, storage, recycling and disposal of biological resources (EC, 2012). Alongside the environmental benefits associated with such innovation, the bioeconomy holds promises regarding the creation of new economic opportunities. Examples of bioeconomy related innovations comprise a range of new products such as biopolymers, fuels, and novel food ad ditives (Frisvold et al, 2021; Wydra et al, 2021), and new processes associated with biorefining (Dahiya et al, 2018; Hellsmark et al, 2016) and industrial biotechnology (Wohlgemuth et al, 2021; Wydra, 2019). In 2015, non-traditional bioeconomy activities only accounted for 4.7% of the European GDP (Kuosmanen et al, 2020). This implies that the bioeconomy still has a long way to go to deliver on its promises. It is of interest to investigate the drivers and barriers that might spur or hinder dynamic bioeconomy development

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Conclusion