INFORMBIO will develop a first Foresight Analysis for Ireland’s bioeconomy. Funded through the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine’s Competitive Research Call, the project aims to gauge available bioresources and value chains which can best contribute to Ireland’s 2050 climate neutrality target.
The collaboration will be led by Munster Technological University (MTU) with Teagasc, NUI Galway and the Central Statistics Office of Ireland. The venture, which has a budget of €996,429.91, will run for a period of four years until 28 February 2026.
The INFORMBIO project will position Ireland as a front-runner among EU member states, by developing a prototype national bioeconomy monitoring system, enabling Ireland to track the development and progress of the bioeconomy against key bioeconomy indicators.
Project Coordinator James Gaffey, Co-director of the Circular Bioeconomy Research Group at Shannon ABC in MTU says: “Given the enormous potential of Ireland’s land and marine biological resources, the circular bioeconomy has emerged as one of the key opportunity areas to decarbonize primary sectors, and the economy as a whole, in a cost-competitive manner. By integrating bioresource and residue modelling, value-chain analysis, techno-economic assessment, life-cycle assessment, and climate scenario modelling, INFORMBIO attempts to quantify and model the potential of a circular bioeconomy to contribute to Ireland’s climate and sustainability targets”.
David Styles, NUI Galway, will lead on life cycle assessment of priority bio-based value chains co-developed with expert stakeholders: “This timely project provides an excellent platform for rigorous, multi-disciplinary evaluation of an array of promising bio-based value chains, in order to identify where and how bioeconomy development can most effectively deliver climate neutrality and circular economy objectives”.
According to Carmen Girón Domínguez, INFORMBIO Project Manager and Researcher at MTU: “The research developed through INFORMBIO will support preparations for a bioeconomy observatory for Ireland, providing a roadmap for Ireland towards implementation of a sustainable bioeconomy, along with the tools to rigorously measure progress towards this objective”.