Farmers have received the recent ban on burning plant remains like a jug of cold water. It is a waste for which, today, there is no clear solution. Smaller debris can be shredded, at the farmer's expense, but what about larger volume debris like trees? The same happens with another by-product of the primary sector: manure. Today they are a problem both for the farmer, who is the one who assumes the economic costs of their management, as well as for the environmental and social ones.
Several entities, both public and private, as well as various groups of end users in the province of Lleida have proposed to turn these problems into economic opportunities thanks to what is known as bioeconomy. In other words, they seek to give an economic outlet to organic surpluses from agricultural, livestock, agro-industrial, forestry and municipal waste management activities. "Essentially, it is about replacing petroleum, a fossil fuel that we must import, for raw materials of organic and local origin," explains Jaume Sió, head of the Technical Cabinet of the Department of Climate Action, Food and Rural Agenda.
Why in the province of Lleida? "Because we generate more than half of the 15 million tons of organic surpluses that are produced annually throughout Catalonia," says Teresa Botargues, adviser on economic transformation at the Lleida Provincial Council. It is estimated that the recovery of all this material for the production of biomaterials and bioproducts has the capacity to generate ten times more jobs and nine times more added value than its direct application as a soil substrate. Specifically, the province of Lleida concentrates 53% of Catalan agricultural production, 47% of livestock production and 35% of the forest area.
Although the province of Lleida has been committed to the bioeconomy for a long time, the moment is now more propitious than ever due to the increase in the prices of energy and some raw materials. The latter is the case of nitrogenous fertilizers, which are produced from gas of fossil origin, but which can be replaced by organic fertilizers made from manure, for example. "There are already technologies that allow it," says Sió.
"The current high prices have aggravated the need, but there is also a will to change because the bioeconomy is seen, by all the actors involved, as an opportunity to be more competitive and more sustainable," says Laura Arribas, head of Ecosistemes i Innovation Policies and Technological Consultancy of the Eurecat technology center. Referring to the technology available to make the bioeconomy a reality, Arribas points out that "many advances have been made lately."
The town of Alcarràs is becoming a testing ground for the bioeconomy. "It is an initiative born from the farmers themselves, who joined forces to transform their slurry into compost and are now in the process of creating a biogas plant," says Botargues. Alcarràs, which concentrates the largest pig and cattle herd in Europe, will also host the first accelerator for circular bioeconomy companies in Catalonia and a space to test bioeconomy projects on an industrial scale, among other initiatives framed within the Bio Hub Cat, promoted with funds Europeans.
