Marine Biotechnology topics at the European Maritime Day | Marinebiotech

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Marine Biotechnology topics at the European Maritime Day

Published 17 June 2014

Marine biotechnology within the context of the biobased economy was one of the topics in focus on this year’s European Maritime Day (EMD) in Bremen on May 19-20. The purpose of EMD is to highlight development trends within the integrated maritime policy. Particular interest was given to “blue growth”. This concept includes emerging maritime industries and business areas. Marine biotechnology is one of the emerging activities within blue growth that is given most attention.

Anders Carlberg, maritime expert at the Region Västra Götaland (VGR) and director of the Maritime Cluster of West Sweden was one of the initiators behind the workshop “Innovative products from the sea – Marine contributions to the biobased economy”, where he contributed as a panellist. The  aim of the workshop was to underline the important role that innovations based on biomarine resources will play in fossil-free economy. By making the connection between marine biotechnology and a biobased economy it was stressed that investment in the development of marine biotechnology is consistent with the general efforts to cut our dependency on fossil resources.

Participants in the workshop came from the Sea Farm project in Sweden, Algae Park, Wageningen University, Algae Center, Denmark, Klaipeda Science and technology Park, Lithuania, and Green Center, Denmark. The workshop was organized by the government of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, and Region Västra Götaland, Sweden.

Each of the institutes and participants presented their activities. In an answer to a question in the final discussion regarding visions of where the biomarine industry will be in five years, most of the participants were hoping that market introductions will be beginning to see the light of day, but still in a relatively small scale.

Speeches, presentations and photos from European Maritime Day 2014 have been added to the programme and media gallery pages of the Bremen conference.