Pro-Enrich will develop a flexible biorefinery approach capable of processing a range of agricultural residues (rapeseed meal, olives, tomatoes and citrus fruits) in response to the increasing global demand for alternative sources of protein and phenolic product streams, tailored to the cross sectoral requirements of industry. Pro-Enrich will optimise existing biomass fractionation technologies and validate novel extraction approaches beyond the current state of the art (from TRL2 through to TRL 4/5) to isolate and purify proteins, polyphenols, dietary fibres and pigments. The products being targeted are food ingredients, pet food, cosmetics and adhesives. These will be developed through an iterative process of feedstock mapping, laboratory process development, functionality/performance testing of samples by industry and pilot upscaling. Pro-Enrich gathers the expertise of 16 partners from 7 countries, covering the entire biorefinery value chain and consisting of 8 SMEs, 5 large enterprises, 2 RTOs and 1 university. The project facilitates supply chain building across different sectors, including biomass production and logistics; materials handling and processing, through to end-users. The project will engage and collaborate with key industry stakeholders from farming and biomass supply, processors and brand name owners. Pro-Enrich produces detailed life-cycle, socio-economic and safety assessments to facilitate policy and decision-making by industry and the EU, inform and guide consumer acceptance and assist with regulatory compliance. The outcome of Pro-Enrich will have a huge economical impact on the involved partners especially the industries and generate a large number of new job positions. However, the impact goes beyond the consortium by contributing to the BBI’s strategy for zero-waste processing in the biobased products sector, by addressing technical, commercial and environmental impact across the whole supply chain.

On average, each European citizen produces approximately 200 kg of municipal biowaste per year, representing between 118 and 138 million tonnes of biowaste annually arising in the EU. The main municipal biowaste management systems currently existing in Europe represent one-way flow systems in which materials and resources are underused, limiting its potential recovery into high-value products. VALUEWASTE proposes an integrated approach in urban biowaste upcycling for the production of high-value biobased products, developing the first complete solution to fully valorise biowaste that can be replicated across Europe. We will implement three new value chains that will use urban biowaste as raw material for its valorisation into high-value end products in a cascading process, generating economic, social and environmental benefits: food & feed proteins and other ingredients, and biobased fertiliser. VALUEWASTE will be developed at two very different European locations, Murcia (ES) and Kalundborg (DK) with the purpose of finding a solution both technical and socially adapted to the different socio-economic contexts exiting across Europe. Social initiatives will be created to increase consumer awareness and acceptance of urban biowaste-derived products. End-user products applications and new market opportunities will be demonstrated. Outcomes of the project will contribute to new standardisation, and will be useful information for EU policy makers in terms of waste management and in the adoption of new policies.

The mushroom sector is an excellent example of circular economy to provide high quality protein from crop substrate based on bio-based agricultural wastes. Productivity is however highly sensitive to several biotic disorders among which fungal parasites are responsible for major crop losses. Although chemical fungicides have been historically employed to fight mycoparasites, regulatory limitations for mushroom growers and increasing consumer awareness are urgently requesting solutions to overcome fungicide dependence. Bacterial strains isolated in a previous research from the casing layer employed in mushroom cultivation have proved to selectively suppress germination and development of most harmful mycoparasites, while additionally selected microbiota proved to work as mushroom growth promoting microorganisms. This project aims to develop a tailor-made solution for the mushroom sector where a peat-free casing soil (peat is an unsustainably sourced on which the sector is highly dependent to produce the peat-based casing employed nowadays) will serve as carrier for the selected microbiota that will act as crop biostimulant. This solution will be validated industrially by 4 different mushroom farms across the EU which integrate all the European cropping systems. BIOSCHAMP will generate a solution to improve industrial profitability while reducing the agronomical need for pesticides by 90%. Additionally, BIOSCHAMP solution will introduce innovation within the industry that will lead to create jobs in low populated rural areas and to secure long-term viability of the sector while complying with regulatory restrictions for chemical fungicides and peat-based materials. To accomplish these ambitious goals, the BIOSCHAMP project features a multidisciplinary consortium representing a complete picture of the European mushroom sector and associated industry with high priority given to mushroom growers noteworthy lead by a growers association.

The EU28 imports 77% of the protein it requires, for food or feed, representing an important vulnerability for our economy, risking our self-sufficiency and food security. GreenProtein aims at a major innovation by producing high-added value, food-grade and fully functional proteins and other ingredients, out of vegetal residues mainly from sugar beet. The main outcome will be the valorisation of 4,000 tons of agricultural residue /yearly into a high quality dried RuBisCo powder ready to enter into food industry production chains as an alternative of the widely extended egg white preparations or whey protein. We are the first team worldwide, covering the whole food chain, to design an extraction system of functional RuBisCO. The project will design and implement specific equipment to establish a demonstration plant with capacity of 1,500 kg/hour of vegetal residue input, rendering 28 Kg of dry RuBisCO and 82 Kg of dry dietary fibre (25-30% dry matter). The obtained protein has top valuable functionalities required in food industry, such as gelling, foaming or emulsifying. The outcomes have excellent market projection due to their application in growing consumer needs like high-protein foodstuff, vegan, halal, etc. Establishing this DEMO plant will allow fine-tuning the extraction process at industrial scale in order to define the optimal conditions for industrial manufacture. It will be built in a compact design, ready to be “plugged” to the production line, an easily replicable system with a high spreading projection in whole EU.

Only in the EU, we generate every year around 89M tonnes of Food Loss and Waste (FLW), accounting for 20% of the total food produced, with costs estimated at ?143 Bn, impacting each stage of the Food Value Chain. In SISTERS, we propose a set of systemic innovations addressed to reduce FLW generated in every stage of the Food Value Chain in Europe that will solve main existing challenges in Production, Processing, Marketing (retailing/wholesaling), Consumption, and the Logistics among stages. SISTERS will design the 1st European Short Chain Platform for farmers to sell their discarded production, favouring local economies, providing access to nutritious and healthy food to the less favoured consumers. Smart and reusable food containers will be designed to diminish food losses during transportation, maintain bulk and packed food in ideal conditions with new accurate sensors allowing immediate reaction. Moreover, to improve the preservation and quality of food a set of bio-based and home-compostable packaging solutions will be created reducing their potential negative impacts in the environment. A novel SISTERS Seal of Excellence will promote sustainable practices among retailers. While the information provided to the consumers with QR and dynamic labelling incorporated in the packaging is expected to impact on retailers and consumers sustainable awareness, thus reducing the discard of food and associated FW. With these cross-sectorial innovations, we will achieve an ambitious environmental & economic impact of the current dynamics in the food system, contributing to the reduction of FLW and to change the unsustainable consumer behaviours. With the support of the EC, SISTERS will be a key EU project addressing the problem in a holistic way, reducing FLW by 27.4% and CO2 emissions by around 20% in the case studies. Our interdisciplinary SISTERS consortium consists of 18 partners from 8 European countries, with wide expertise in fighting FLW from Farm