EU-India Brokerage Event on Bio-economy and SAHYOG Stakeholder Conference

TERI under the aegis of ongoing Indo EU networking initiative 'SAHYOG' organized the two day brokerage and stakeholders event on Bio-economy. Sponsored by European Commission and Department of Biotechnology (DBT) Government of India, this event was the first comprehensive deliberation on Bio-economy and aimed at strengthening EU-India collaboration in the field of bio-based economy by facilitating linkages between existing projects and triggering new collaborations particularly with the industries.

With inauguration by Dr Philippe de Taxis du Poet from DG, Research and Innovation, European Commission and Dr Renu Swarup from DBT, this event witnessed participation from senior management of industry, active researchers from national and international institutes, representatives from Embassy, stakeholders from small and medium enterprises, NGO's, financing institutions, business schools, and most importantly the farmer organizations, both from EU member states and India.

The deliberations were focused on understanding the importance of transition towards bio-based economy with the perspective from both EU and India. The highlight of the event was the overwhelmed response from the industry through participation of their senior management and dialogue on opportunities as well as technology and policy gaps in this emerging field.

One of the major outcome of the event was the focused deliberations on Strategic Research Agenda that is being is developed through project SAHYOG, in order to facilitate concerted planning of future joint EU-India research initiatives. The discussion lead to a clear road map of activities leading to identifying pathways in promoting technologies and policies that will drive Europe and India to an increased exploration of biotechnology for biomass production and biowaste conversion.