Biobord is an online platform for bioeconomy innovation, knowledge sharing, discussion and networking. Our aim is to bring bioeconomy developers together around Baltic Sea Region to solve joint problems.
This platform offers you bioeconomy services from our five partner region (PL, FI, NO, LP, EE) for example agricultural advisory services and courses for business entrepreneurs. By using our forum you’ll get a chance for international matchmaking, knowledge sharing, discussion and innovating.
It is a place for you, if you are interested in being part of a global bioeconomy network. Find people with shared interests, team up and get support to build your business or launch your innovation to global markets. The power of Biobord Network is now in your hands.
Join our community and register today!
Biobord.eu is a platform created to connect bioeconomy developers around the Baltic Sea Region. By presenting your ideas, questions or calls for expertise, you may get in touch with just the right people to help you out! Here you can read the success stories of Biobord, how the forum and network of people around the Baltic Sea Region have made many things possible and successful!
Project partnerships can use an opportunity to create a closed group for internal matters and discussions, as well as be engaged in the joint environment which is made for all platform users.
BeUBio partnership, which consists of 8 partners from across the Baltic Sea Region, aims to promote youth involvement for transition to a bio-based economy and create synergies with other actors and initiatives addressing the UN Sustainable Development Goals. They needed a place for storing documents, to organize discussions and to place updates of the project issues, so everyone can follow the progress. They see Biobord as a professional environment where they can develop ideas about the project and spread the word. As the BeUBio project coordination is progressing and first tangible results are expected soon, Biobord will serve not only as a coordinating platform but also as the place for disseminating their results to the entire bioeconomy developer’s community of Biobord.
Companies can find inspiring ideas as well as support and improvement visions for their work.
A Polish company wants to follow solutions for the local food producers, inspired by an idea presented on Biobord Forum. They are planning activities to support local farmers in selling their products. In Poland, buying products from local farmers is not a tradition, however it is getting more and more popular. People realize that locally grown food creates important opportunities, provides health benefits and helps to reduce environmental impact. It is also important because it helps to bring the community together and it builds good relationship between consumers and local food producers. The company states: “Biobord is a great source of information and ideas for us. We appreciate the possibility of exchanging knowledge and experiences between the users. For us, Biobord is full of brilliant ideas and really inspiring!”
For researchers, it is important to keep updated on both other researches being conducted, and the industry/civil society’s needs. A great way of doing that is to get in touch with researchers and civilians elsewhere.
Arne Linløkken, a researcher at Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, wants to develop methodology for testing water quality by satellite images and drones, and asked on Biobord if anyone was interested in collaborating on this topic. Mr Linløkken found what he was looking for when the Biobord team matched him with Tiina Siimekselä at JAMK for further discussions. We are now eagerly waiting to hear if they come up with a joint research idea and funding for their project!
Businesses are often in need for collaborators for both investments and innovations.
Lämpösi Oy in Jyväskylä, Central Finland, innovated a wood chip and pellet blower and a logistic system for small heating plants, and was searching for organisations interested in utilizing their delivery system, as well as retailers for marketing and sale. They made a post including a video presenting their product at Biobord.eu and found a new partner in Finland. Mr. Markku Miettinen, representative for Lämpösi Oy, states: “Biobord connected us with Keuruu Development Company and the future will tell what kind of cooperation it will bring on. It is proven that Biobord Forum really works, and we are already planning to make new posts on Biobord. I really count on its utility”.
Innovation requires that creative people are willing to share their ideas and thoughts.
Paper Province, Sweden, launched an international innovation competition “What WOOD you do?”, which focused on ideas within forest bioeconomy and used Biobord.eu to disseminate information about the competition. Several users of the platform responded, and both the represented universities of applied sciences and businesses were interested.
The competition gathered 53 innovation ideas from 10 countries! The final is taking place in Sweden in September 2020, with six finalists attending on a Hackathon to show their ideas and introduce them to business leaders, innovation experts and investors. We’ll eagerly wait for the results and great innovations that come out of the competition!
The Interreg project ecoINSIDE2 focuses, among other subjects, on solar power and had an idea on using this for wildlife warnings in off-grid areas. On Biobord.eu, they asked for expertise on this subject – and JAMK University of Applied Science replied that they had both students and lecturers with specialization in this field. Perhaps the future will give us better wildlife warnings also in areas without power grids?
As a part of their work with local food, Regional Council of Central Finland (RCCF) was collecting good practices of local food innovations and projects from other places and asked for this at Biobord. They got answers from both Estonia and Norway, who shared ideas and projects from their regions. Through this network, RCCF also got in touch with some of the distributors of local food, to learn from them. Enni Huotari from RCCF states: “Rural areas have quite similar obstacles to overcome while developing local food chains. Our post on Biobord gave new ideas to us, and I am positive that the answers we got are beneficial also for other members and regions of Biobord community.”
Small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and start-ups often need to expand the network to connect with potential partners with the right knowledge.
In Norway, the SME Bioenergi Innlandet needed increased knowledge about a delivery to a wood chip heating plant and asked Tretorget Ltd for help. Through their network at Biobord.eu, Tretorget managed to gain both expertise from JAMK and funding for this. Thus, Bioenergi Innlandet could fulfil their contract as planned, and the acquired knowledge strengthens their position for future assignments and contracts.
Educational organizations can benefit from the network and use it to gather information, people and other organizations together.
Jyväskylä University of Applied Sciences (JAMK) is the lead partner of RDI2CluB and initiated to apply for an extension of the project. They asked the other project partners via Biobord.eu to collaborate, and via the platform we included new partners, developed a plan for the extension stage and wrote the application. The project extension was approved by the Interreg Baltic Sea Region secretariat just before the summer, and the project team looks forward to embarking on the new tasks.
Students may be in a need for experts to gain knowledge and a better understanding of the topics they study.
Elina Siivari, a Finnish student, is writing her master’s thesis on management in bio-sector organisations and needed to get in touch with potential interviewees for her research. She posted a call for experts at Biobord and got several answers from bioeconomy experts willing to share their knowledge and experience. We wish Elina the best of luck in working on her thesis!
These were the success stories from Biobord this time, we are eagerly waiting for more in the future! Many different kinds of actors can use Biobord Platform as a way to reach to success; finding funding, partners or a helping hand on the way!
Interreg BSR 2014.–2020. programme project “Rural RDI milieus in transition towards smart bioeconomy clusters and innovation ecosystems” (RDI2Club) was presented during the Vidzeme Innovation week in Latvia, where in a parallel session “Bioeconomy Innovations in Food Production and Gastronomy” Johannes Kisser, managing director at Alchemia-nova, presented “Biomass conversion to high added value products – biorefinery innovation”.
The guest started out by invoking the linear economy – the problems that it faces and the damage that is done on the environment and society –, while introducing the subject “Potential Innovations”. A brief insight of how a system can look like it is defined around three strategic pathways – circle economy, nature based and participatory – was shown to the participants and a short introduction to Alchemia-nova was made to give an example for the possibilities of re-designing your own company to better suit the environmental needs.
“If you want to see one step ahead and see how nature solves the problems, trees have done this for 3.8 billion years”, Kisser stressed, while discussing how a tree has the capability of applying many services, including, giving shelter and fresh air, cleaner water, while also being an innovation source. Expert invited the audience to look at a city as an ecosystem, implying that we are used to trust plants to do most of the work for us, as we prefer nature-based solutions over the technological ones. We look at plants as our superheroes, our workers. For example, plants are now used as façade structures in hotels and other public buildings, while also performing as an air treatment. Not only that, plant-based self-sufficient (mobile) unisex urinals are built, which can be seen in Vienna.
“We can do much more water-cycles on a bigger scale,” Kisser implied while talking about Horizon 2020 project, which focuses on salt water being treated just by solar desalination, thus, giving a chance to recover salt, tropical fruits and sweet water. The usage of wastewater is considered a good practice example, especially on islands where the water is shipped from mainland, if there are not any natural rain-capturing systems, because the carbon stored in wastewater is the Sun energy metabolised in our system.
Kisser mentioned that there are multiple tricks on how to capture humidity by condensation, by using cold seawater, while highlighting that, as of now, it is possible to do the same scenario in buildings. By collecting the wastewater from houses, it can be used on farming setups. On a municipal level, the next step would be to use wastewater or the organic fraction from the municipal solid waste and make cosmetics, building materials for construction and other valuable resources. The idea is for the buildings to work as converters of nutrients. One of the good practice examples mentioned was a company in Spain, which provides citizens with containers and when the organic waste is produced, they extract plastics from them, thus decreasing the costs of making bio-plastics by 50%. By collecting the waste streams around the city and metabolizing them, they can become the new sources, hence being a great example of circular economy.
The development of biorefineries was looked at, to predict the close future of bioeconomy. With all of the changes in the system, everything that is now deriving from petrol will decline, whether it’s 20 or 50 years from now, so there will be a need to rely on biomass. “If you burn wood, you have a very high value material and a very low-cost application,” said Kisser, doubting that it is the cleverest way to work with biomass. On that note, bio cascading – a usage of fine chemicals without breaking apart the high-value molecules built by plants – was introduced. By using them as they are, more value is recovered. The expert reminded the participants about the importance of our surroundings while highlighting that circular bioeconomy is all about value and cooperation and providing three brief examples that his company has worked on.
Several examples on vine, olives and trees were given, proving that even branches, wax and needles have something valuable to provide for humans to convert it into much more.
The session “Bioeconomy Innovations in Food Production and Gastronomy” was organised within Interreg Baltic Sea Region programme projects “Rural RDI milieus in transition towards smart Bioeconomy Clusters and Innovation Ecosystems” (RDI2CluB), “Unlocking the Potential of Bio-based Value Chains in the Baltic Sea region” (BalticBiomass4Value), Interreg Estonia – Latvia programme project “Design and promotion of tourism product based on Livonian culinary heritage” (Livonian Culinary Route).
For more information about RDI2CluB activities in Vidzeme Planning Region, contact project manager Santa Niedola, santa.niedola@vidzeme.lv
Krinova Incubator and Science park in Skåne region, Sweden is an integrated incubator, science park, innovation arena and cross-cluster community. It offers innovation and development aid to both companies that are at the conceptual stage as well as to established companies. Krinova was established in 1999 and is the largest and first incubator and science park with food as profile area. The mission of Krinova is to enhance the region of Skåne's attractiveness and contribute to its development, by working to create and offer:
Krinova is an innovation-driving node and a key driver of this work is the community of individual entrepreneurs, researchers, students, companies, public as well as non-profit organisations that together represent a wealth of experience, knowledge and willingness to develop and evolve.
Over a period of about 10 years, Krinova has built up a community of over 1,000 food- companies in Skåne, and created a good international reputation for Krinova's work to help build innovation environments with a food focus in other countries. Participants from around the world take part in the annual innovation competition “Food Hackathon by Krinova”, with over 21 countries represented in the latest competition.
Being owned by the municipality of Kristianstad and Kristianstad University, 80 respective 20%, Krinova is a public body, non-profit organisation and act with the interest of companies and our stakeholders in mind. Our outreach is regional, national and international, we are currently engaged in various cooperations with a broad, diverse spectra of partners in different funding programmes such as relevant Interreg-programmes (A to C), ESF and ERUF and which all align and contribute to innovations and to strengthen businesses and growth in the food, environment and health areas. Krinova is one of the 65 members of the national association for Swedish Incubators & Science Parks (SISP).
Interreg BSR 2014.–2020. programme project “Rural RDI milieus in transition towards smart bioeconomy clusters and innovation ecosystems” (RDI2Club) was presented during the Vidzeme Innovation week in Latvia, where in a parallel session “Bioeconomy Innovations in Food Production and Gastronomy” experts shared their experience and engaged into the discussion with audience. Dr. Pekka Kilpeläinen, research manager at Oulu University in Finland, gave a presentation on “Wild innovations and wild forest berries: R&D together with SMEs and larger companies”.
At the very beginning of the lecture, it was stated that berry-picking and wild berries belong to Finnish folk culture and many families have taught their children berry-picking to understand the meaning behind money-earning. As of now, for example, the income for Taiwanese pickers is so significant, that it is possible to earn two-years’ worth of salary in only two months. Dr. Kilpeläinen highlighted one of the problems faced by the industry – too many berries are exported without processing, while there is a huge demand and potential in berry products locally –, hence the research and development is required.
The expert gave a brief introduction of the Unit of Measurement Technology and their way of cooperating with different companies, while focusing on applied research, stating that the Unit is provided with the technologies needed in product development for processing and analysing berries and other natural products. “Quite often we form consortiums where several companies from our region and one or two bigger ones are represented so that an ecosystem could be formed and everyone would benefit from it,” Dr. Kilpeläinen commented.
The participants got acquainted to lingonberries, which are known for giving harvest every autumn and being the most abundant berries, and their characteristics. Although, nowadays the most commercially significant and most researched is blueberry, lingonberry has plenty to give. “Because of the lack of research, there is a door of opportunity for further development,” implied the expert, while mentioning that the project was started because of the huge amount of lingonberry side stream that one of the regional companies was producing.
Dr. Kilpeläinen also offered an in-depth analysis of lingonberries for participants to understand the valuable components which can be found in them. Turns out, these berries consist of a powerful antioxidant, which is beneficial for health. It is decreasing inflammation and the effect of cancer and hypertension and can be useful in many other ways. A brief description of the study process was provided, and conclusions given, showing multiple discoveries which would determine that this berry has even more benefits than it was thought beforehand. The expert introduced the participants with the product made in cooperation with multiple organisations by using the formula created by Dr. Kilpeläinens’ team of researchers and scientists.
The participants got acquainted to several other end-products and experiments and were encouraged to use more products in the form of powder because of its favourable features. “It takes less space and the logistics is easier,” he added. While discussing the use of cryoconcentration, Dr. Kilpeläinen gave examples on products such as beer and birch sap and mentioned that there’s also equipment for large scale use but it’s too expensive for most of the companies marking one of the many difficulties the researchers face daily.
The session “Bioeconomy Innovations in Food Production and Gastronomy” was organised within Interreg Baltic Sea Region programme projects “Rural RDI milieus in transition towards smart Bioeconomy Clusters and Innovation Ecosystems” (RDI2CluB), “Unlocking the Potential of Bio-based Value Chains in the Baltic Sea region” (BalticBiomass4Value), Interreg Estonia – Latvia programme project “Design and promotion of tourism product based on Livonian culinary heritage” (Livonian Culinary Route).
For more information about RDI2CluB activities in Vidzeme Planning Region, contact project manager Santa Niedola, santa.niedola@vidzeme.lv
EDITORIAL
Year 2020 has been significant in Central Finland, as well as in the whole world. The Bioeconomy campus of Saarijärvi, Finland has raised its ability to work as the developer of bioeconomy through various R&D bioeconomy projects and through its core actions. COVID-19 has made us realize how depended we are from agriculture, food production and other basic products.
Education provided by Bioeconomy Campus of Saarijärvi offers education and training for the basic areas of bioeconomy: agriculture and food production, clean air, clean water, and environment. The need of experts is increasing, and by that the level of expertise. Bioeconomy Campus is responding to this by offering high quality vocational education together with bachelor and master level studies in agriculture.[SA2] There are limitless options for using renewable natural resources, and for sure all opportunities have not been discovered yet! Finland has lots to teach for other countries about its bioeconomy expertise and innovations. Global markets are calling!
The Bioeconomy Campus has a staff and students of 600. They all will do their best to develop bioeconomy and this newsletter will tell their stories.
Mr. Pekka Janhonen, Education Manager at POKE Vocational College &
Ms. Minna Lappalainen, Director of JAMK University of Applied Sciences, Institute of Bioeconomy
LUKE, JAMK and POKE towards tighter cooperation!
LUKE (Natural Resources Institute Finland), JAMK University of Applied Sciences and POKE Vocational College are strengthening cooperation on the know-how of business, innovation, and entrepreneurship in the field of bioeconomy and circular economy.
FORESTRY TEACHING WITH POKE AND METSÄHALLITUS
POKE (vocational school of Northern Finland) and Metsähallitus (state owned forestry company) are creating a new forest teaching contract. Goal is to establish this new type of cooperation starting from 01.01.2021. Contract covers forest area of 699,5-hectare and allows POKE and the Institute of Bioeconomy to use state’s forest for teaching purpose. This ensures forestry and makes other educational functions possible.
LARGE AMOUNT OF INFORMATION AVAILABLE FOR THE ENTREPRENEURS OF RURAL CENTRAL FINLAND
Networking and peer-to-peer learning were the main goals when suitable digital solutions were tested in MataDigi-project (JAMK). Virtual barn visit, interactive workshops, and discussions with experts, experience sharing via video, were seen as functional methods. Biobord On Stage event presented best practices and tips for rural networking and peer-to-peer learning. Recording of the event is available on Biobord-platform: https://forum.biobord.eu/t/hubs-on-stage-how-to-develop-effective-peer-to-peer-learning-of-agriculture-entrepreneurs/1374/4
Horse management infos collected large audience in April. PÄMÄ-project in JAMK, Institute of Bioeconomy hosted multiple events for horse-entrepreneurs. For example, about breeding. Events were held online, and they were seen very useful.
LaTu-project in JAMK, Institute of Bioeconomy offers also vast amount of information about sheep business via webinars and Biobord discussion group. Biobord group has an open side for all parties interested. Welcome to join: https://forum.biobord.eu/c/lets-talk-about-sheep-business/70
BIOECONOMY BUSINESS ACCELERATOR IS HERE FOR ENTREPRENEURS
COVID-19 has had a large negative impact to the SMEs of whole world. Bioeconomy Business Accelerator BioPaavo has been offering their support to local businesses through out the COVID-spring. Weekly webinars have offered SMEs information about funding possibilities and other support methods, as well as summer job information for young people. BioPaavo has their own open discussion group on Biobord and they will soon launch an international topic there. Share your ideas and join the discussion!
ASTROLOGISTS WANTED!
Apply for UAS studies in Agriculture. Applications period 02.09. – 16.09.2020. (Note that Degree programmes are offered in Finnish, but we also offer exchange studies). JAMK Institute of Bioeconomy offers both Bachelor and Master level Degree programmes in Agriculture. https://www.jamk.fi/en/Education/Natural-Resources/
5G IN AGRICULTURE
JAMK, Institute of Bioeconomy and BioPaavo project hosted last week a 5G in Agriculture workshop in Saarijärvi, Finland. Workshop attracted more than 40 people and gave multiple sights into development of a 5G test environment serving needs of agriculture entrepreneurs, research, education, and other stakeholders. Common work continues. Should you be interested in taking part of the development of rural 5G test environment, please contact project manager Merja Rehn (merja.rehn@jamk.fi).
WELCOME TO GREEN TARVAALA-DAY!
Tarvaala Campus of Bioeconomy is hosting annual open doors-day with Green Tarvaala -theme. Day will include local food market and local entrepreneurs are there to present their businesses. Green Tarvaala will take place 11.09.2020 in Saarijärvi, Tarvaala campus.
Happy summer holidays!
Wishes Bioeconomy Campus, Saarijärvi, Finland
Rural RDI milieus in transition towards smart bioeconomy clusters and innovation ecosystems, RDI2CluB –project, is co-financed with the European Regional Development Fund.