Mr Robert-Jan Smits
Director-General
DG Research & Innovation
European Commission
B - 1049 Brussels
5th September, 2012
Dear Director-General Smits,
COPA COGECA support to the Public Private Partnership (PPP) on Biobased
Industries
As a founding member of the PPP on biobased industries, COPA COGECA would like to reiterate
its commitment to this European project.
We are convinced that the global paradigm shift from oil-based to biobased materials
represents a unique opportunity for Europe to kick-start a world-leading competitive biobased
industry over the next decade, with significant economic, environmental and societal benefits.
Supplementing food production, the conversion of biomass into bioproducts will present a
chance for the EU27 agricultural and forestry sectors to diversify revenues and lead the push
to reindustrialise Europe
With leading companies in the biobased sector and a strong agricultural and forestry base,
Europe is well placed to take advantage of its technological edge. However, other regions such
as the US, Brazil and China have engaged in the race towards the bioeconomy by making
significant public investments in bringing biorefineries to commercial scale.
Companies and associations involved in the emerging PPP on biobased industries are
committed to make it happen in Europe. We were very pleased to see the market driven
approach taken by Horizon 2020 and the Bioeconomy Strategy, in particular the reference to
the PPP as a tool to address the innovation “death valley”. Since then, we have invested work,
time and resources to ensure we are ready to enter the PPP journey. This is a symbol of our
commitment and enthusiasm for this project which is only increasing over time.
We have now put together a team of experts to contribute to the Impact Assessment, prepare
the Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda and support our communication activities. We
are multiplying effort to raise awareness among national and EU policy leaders to ensure that
they support the decision for a JTI on biobased industries in due time. We are also broadening
the PPP membership with new companies joining us.
We talked about radical innovation in our vision document from R&D and deployment to
market pull, to deliver biobased products superior, or at least comparable to, non-biobased
products in terms of price, performance and availability, and environmental benefits. This is
truly what we want to achieve and feel the PPP can act as a shutter release with a positive
domino effect across Europe.
Biobased Industries PPP, Avenue Louise 250, Brussels, xxx.xxxxxxx@xxxx.xxx
We are defining and will achieve ambitious objectives by 2020 with this PPP that will
significantly leverage the public contribution.
We are well aware we will face unprecedented levels of scrutiny; in difficult economic times,
justifying a PPP is increasingly challenging. However, we would strongly recommend not losing
a tangible opportunity to initiate sustainable growth and job creation in rural Europe.
We are truly excited about the prospect of working together with you to make the PPP happen
and deliver on its ambitious objectives by 2020. A lengthy and difficult decision-making
process is ahead of us and we therefore very much look forward to the official launch of the
public consultation in September 2012.
We would also like to take the opportunity to invite you to the stakeholder consultation event
we will be holding on 10 September in Brussels to raise awareness about this emerging PPP
and get input and comments on the preparation work conducted so far.
We would like to thank you in advance for your kind consideration of this letter and look
forward to meeting with you to discuss this topic in more details on 11 September.
Sincerely,
Pekka Pesonen
Secretary General, COPA COGECA
Biobased Industries PPP, Avenue Louise 250, Brussels, xxx.xxxxxxx@xxxx.xxx