Investors champion biotechnology with AI as the engine of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, but despite Europe’s strong ambitions biotech analysts say legislation designed for chemicals is not fit for the biological. The result is an exodus of talent and investment.
Despite the presentation of a new compromise text from the Belgian presidency, national experts could not find an agreement to unblock one of the agrifood unfinished dossier of the legislature.
Biosolutions are nature's tools, offering a powerful pathway to accelerate the transition towards a sustainable and greener future, while potentially strengthening Europe’s resilience, supply chain sovereignty and competitiveness.
Europe needs a Bio Act according to MEP Pernille Weiss (EPP). Weiss and other expert speakers at the European High-Level Summit on Biosolutions said failing to develop an effective biosolutions framework will lead to a stifling of innovation and growth.
Fresh from a company merger, Novonesis CEO Ester Baiget came to Brussels with an important ask – to create a level playing field for biosolutions; arguing it makes no sense to treat enzymes and proteins as if they were manmade.
Europe is on the cusp of a technological revolution. Unlike the Industrial Revolution’s massive factories, the bio-revolution centres around micro-factories. Biosolutions represent the fusion of biology and technology, offering powerful tools to address climate change.
Germany's environment and agriculture ministries are apparently currently working on restrictions for the production of biofuels so that more grain can be used as human food as agriculture markets remain strained due to the war in Ukraine. EURACTIV Germany reports.
Biomass will be used to meet particularly high energy demands, according to the German government's so-called "Easter Package", which aims to use agricultural raw materials for energy production in response to the war in Ukraine.
The EU's policy priorities are a once-in-a-generation change to the regulatory framework offering both the industrial biotech and healthcare sectors an opportunity to set a direction for the next decades, says the newly appointed chairman of EuropaBio.
The EU executive looks set to press ahead with a "new approach" to genetically modified (GM) crop authorisations in the wake of persistent lack of political support for the technology in the European Parliament.
The European Commission adopted its intellectual property plan in November, hailed as a driver of future growth, but the plant breeding sector remains divided over the potential of intellectual property rights for spurring on much-needed agricultural innovation.
While the EU considers the potential role of new innovative techniques to protect harvests from pests and diseases, on the other side of the Channel, the UK is getting ready to open the door to new gene-editing technologies post-Brexit.
In an environmental audit meeting on Thursday (18 June), UK Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, George Eustice offered his support for gene editing after Brexit, saying that the UK government disagrees with the EU stance on …
Italy's agricultural minister Teresa Bellanova expressed an interest in developing sustainable biotechnology, in the light of a milestone agreement on next-gen biotech between farmers organisation Coldiretti and the Italian Society of Agricultural Genetics (SIGA).
The centrist Renew Europe group in the European Parliament aims to “break taboos” in the agricultural sector, according to one of its Czech deputies, Martin Hlaváček.
The new EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides wants more information about the controversial issue of gene editing and for now, she seems less enthusiastic than her predecessor Vytenis Andriukaitis.
The plant protection part of the upcoming Farm to Fork strategy should take a realistic and science-based approach that allows farmers to “explore all possible solutions”, French conservative MEP Anne Sander told EURACTIV.
When it comes to food, EU policymakers should make science-based decisions if they want to help European their farmers tackle the “legitimate concerns” over sustainability, Sonny Perdue, the US State Secretary of Agriculture, said on Monday (27 January).
The agri-food industry and EU farmers are calling for clarity and science-based solutions to meet their objectives as part of the EU's recently announced European Green Deal. The new plans, combined with the ‘Farm to Fork’ strategy and a reformed Common …
Despite the ongoing legal uncertainty over the future of new plant breeding innovation in Europe, US agricultural company Corteva Agriscience has signed the first major deal on genome editing tools with French seed producer Vilmorin & Cie.
The question of whether the UK will open its doors to GMOs after Brexit has become more pertinent after EU Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier told MEPs on Tuesday (26 November) that in order to secure a trade agreement, the UK would have to agree to maintain a ‘level playing field’ and not undercut EU regulation.
It is much easier for larger companies to implement new GM legislation, but it's the smaller ones that are most affected by the recent gene-editing ruling, the chair of the agriculture committee (AGRI) MEP, Norbert Lins, told EURACTIV.com at the sidelines of a recent plant breeding conference.
More than 2,500 scientists across the EU have joined forces and reached out to the EU parliament in a letter urging them to “to act on the science, and undertake a far-reaching reform of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) without delay.”
According to the UN, the amount of food produced globally needs to double to feed a rising world population. Policymakers are poring over ways to ensure the sustainability of food systems while emerging new technologies, promising to tackle climate change, still face resistance.
