EU Report – The future of the EU algae sector
When reading this report, one see that the focus on the European algae market has a B2C focus and that the acceptance of algae-based products is low, at least for areas where algae is an integrated part of what we eat. On the American market, we haven’t begun to discuss algae as food on any larger scale. Based on this, The Oaktree has made the strategic decision to focus on industrial markets, such as oleic fatty acids, protein, and carbohydrates, all of which are already huge markets. The Oaktree’s benefit is that we come in as a carbon-negative product that enables our customers to reduce their carbon footprint. Our challenge lies in reducing the cost of production, this is why we have focused on the waste market where our volumes of feedstock are infinite and often materials, and often our suppliers have disposal problems as well.
The table below reflects a combination of micro-, and macro algae, and food. The thing that concerns us is
Benefits: Green Deal, Various commercial applications, Lo-carbon aquaculture, Bioconomy development
Challenges: Fragmented governance, Low production levels
The largest challenge for The Oaktree is to be the first, not that it prevents our efforts in any way. We see all the technically successful trials that we are on the right path of “changing manufacturing to a circular process instead of linear.” The Okatree’s challenge is not technical, it’s perception and engagement (not The Oaktree’s).
We all know that our current manufacturing, transportation with agricultural practices aren’t the way forward, the problem lies in changing our minds. There is no silver bullet, solar and wind aren’t enough, that is why we have designed THe Oaktree, the world’s first carbon-negative multi-factory scalable platform.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This paper gives an overview of European algae production, including applications, opportunities and barriers (Section 2), provides an outline of the European and global algae sector development (Section 3), and summarises the main aspects of the Commission’s EU Algae Initiative (Section 4). a. European algae production The European algae sector produced a total of 287 390 tonnes in 2019, representing 0.8% of the global production. The vast majority of this production is based on macroalgae with a small fraction of less than 1 % originating from microalgae.
In the EU, France, Ireland and Spain are the top three countries in terms of turnover, employment and number of macroalgae companies. The top four Member States with the highest number of microalgae companies are Spain, Germany, France and Italy. European macroalgae production is predominantly based in the North Atlantic. It mainly relies on wild stock harvesting as the most common production method. The most common seaweed applications include food, food-related products, as well as cosmetics and well-being. Seaweed aquaculture production is well positioned to play a key role for sustainable production operations, food security and climate change mitigation.
Conversely, increasing sustainability issues with wild harvesting, high production costs and a limited market demand, are some of the key barriers hampering the macroalgae sector in its development. Microalgae production in Europe is land-based and occurs in photobioreactors (71%), ponds (19%) and fermenters (10%). Common microalgae applications include food supplements and nutraceuticals, cosmetics and wellbeing products, as well as feed.
Given the common use of photobioreactors for production, the European microalgae sector is in a unique position for producing high-value algae-based products, such as nutraceuticals, with a variety of additional potential applications under development. Limited capacity to increase production using reactors, high production costs, as well as administrative barriers, are some of the main challenges associated with the sector.
b. Global algae sector Global algae production has increased from 0.56 million tonnes in 1950 to 35.82 million tonnes in 2019. Over 97% of all production comes from Asia with Chinese production accounting for 57% globally. Besides China, Indonesia (27% of global production), South Korea (5%) and the Philippines (4%) are major producers.
Macroalgae account for over 99% of global algae production. As mirrored by European production patterns, Saccharina is the most commonly produced macroalgae group globally, accounting for 36% of the total production. For the microalgae sector, green microalgae are the most commonly produced group, although when including cyanobacteria with microalgae, Spirulina dominates production in Europe and globally.
The substantial growth of global algae production is not reflected by European production patterns, which have remained relatively flat. Nevertheless, the highest number of seaweed start-ups and equity investments in the algae sector occur in Europe.France and Norway are generally seen as the frontrunners of the European algae sector, having substantially increased production levels since 2018. c.
EU Algae Initiative On 15 November 2022, the European Commission published its communication “Towards a Strong and Sustainable EU Algae Sector”, also known as the EU Algae Initiative. This initiative sets out a strategic approach for developing algae production and associated value chains in the Union.
The IPOL | Policy Department for Structural and Cohesion Policies 8 communication follows up on different Commission reports, publications and policy initiatives, largely associated with the European Green Deal. The aim of the initiative is to unlock the potential of algae production as part of the Blue Bioeconomy. To this end, benefits and challenges related to the current setup and future projections of the algae sector are described (Figure 1), accompanied by action areas for growing the industry.
ABOUT THE PUBLISHER To contact the Policy Department or to subscribe to updates on our work for the PECH Committee please write to: Poldep-cohesion@ep.europa.eu Manuscript completed in February 2023, 1st revision uploaded in March 2023 © European Union, 2023 This document is available on the internet in summary with option to download the full text at: https://bit.ly/3ZszAt2 This document is available on the internet at: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/document.html?reference=IPOL_STU(2023)733114 Further information on research for PECH by the Policy Department is available at: https://research4committees.blog/pech/ Follow us on Twitter: @PolicyPECH
