News Excerpt:

India’s Bio-economy witnessed a double-digit growth rate.

What is Bio-Economy?

It is defined as "the production of renewable biological resources and the conversion of these resources and waste streams into value-added products such as food, feed, bio-based products, and bio-energy." (EU: 2020)

• Resource recovery from waste streams, such as municipal or industrial, is one of the key components of promoting a circular city approach.
• A circular city approach transforms waste products into sustainable and environmentally friendly bio-based products to reduce resource waste.

Why is there a need for Bio-Economy?

• Job creation: It would create millions of Green Jobs, especially in rural and coastal areas.

• Carbon Mitigation and Carbon Neutrality: It would reduce the overall atmospheric emissions and our dependence on fossil fuels.

• Modernization: These processes will introduce innovations in agriculture, aquaculture, forestry, and other industries, thus helping them to become environmentally sustainable.

• Ecosystem and Biodiversity restoration: It will help recover the degraded part of our ecosystem by not exploiting excess amount of resources.

• Achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): The circular economy holds promise for achieving multiple SDGs, including SDGs 6 on energy, 8 on economic growth, 11 on sustainable cities, 12 on sustainable consumption and production, 13 on climate change, 14 on oceans, and 15 on life on land.

How is India inching Towards Bio-economy?

• India is set to achieve $150 billion Bio-Economy by 2025, which stood at over $100 billion in 2022. 

• Biotech Sector: The biotech sector particularly for vaccines, diagnostics, and therapeutics has already shown to the world that India can fight global challenges like the COVID pandemic from the forefront and contribute with best-in-class solutions not only for itself but for the world.

  • Biotech Startups have grown 100 times in the last 8 years (2014-2022) from 52 odd startups in 2014 to 6,300 plus presently.

  • BioPharma Industry in 2021 tripled their R&D spending to nearly $1 billion from $360 million in 2020.

• Agriculture sector: The agriculture sector which employs nearly 60% of India’s population has a large scope of improvement.

  • BT Cotton, Biopesticides, Biostimulants, and Biofertilizers contributed to about $10.48 billion in 2021 for the Bio-economy of the country.

• National Biopharma Mission (NBM): The National Biopharma Mission (NBM) is an industry-Academia Collaborative Mission for accelerating biopharmaceutical development in the country. Under this Mission, the Government has launched the Innovate in India (i3) program to create an enabling ecosystem to promote entrepreneurship and indigenous manufacturing in the sector. This mission is implemented by the Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC).

• Clean Energy International Incubation Centre: The Clean Energy International Incubation Centre is a first-of-its-kind International Incubation Centre jointly established by DBT/BIRAC, Tata Trust & Tata Power in 2018 under the Mission Innovation multilateral program. The Incubator provides access to advanced labs and equipment, a pool of experts & mentors, and live testbeds with the opportunity to conduct Pilots.

• Fostering High-Performance Biomanufacturing: DBT has undertaken a major initiative on “Fostering High-Performance Biomanufacturing- An integrated approach towards promoting circular economy for Green, Clean, and Prosperous India”.

Way Forward:

India has a huge unsaturated wealth of bio-resources, waiting to be harnessed. A push to bio-economy will lead to the development of a skilled workforce, and a surge in job creation and entrepreneurship, especially in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. A suitable strategy is required in the form of an action plan including both local and central governments to make full use of the bio-resources and for adequate growth of the Bio-Economy sector.