Global Inequalities And Extractive Knowledge Production In The Bioeconomy

This open access book focuses on the meanings, agendas, as well as the local and global implications of bioeconomy and bioenergy policies in and across South America, Asia and Europe. It explores how a transition away from a fossil and towards a bio-based economic order alters, reinforces and challenges socio-ecological inequalities. The volume presents a historically informed and empirically rich discussion of bioeconomy developments with a particular focus on bio-based energy. A series of conceptual discussions and case studies with a multidisciplinary background in the social sciences illuminate how the deployment of biomass sources from the agricultural and forestry sectors affect societal changes concerning knowledge production, land and labour relations, political participation and international trade. How can a global perspective on socio-ecological inequalities contribute to a complex and critical understanding of bioeconomy? Who participates in the negotiation of specific bioeconomy policies and who does not? Who determines the agenda? To what extent does the bioeconomy affect existing socio-ecological inequalities in rural areas? What are the implications of the bioeconomy for existing relations of extraction and inequalities across regions? The volume is an invitation to reflect upon these questions and more, at a time when the need for an ecological and socially just transition away from a carbon intensive economy is becoming increasingly pressing.

This book is at the cutting edge of the ongoing research in bioeconomy and encompasses both technological and economic strategies to master the transformation towards a knowledge- and bio-based production system. The volume combines different international perspectives with approaches of the various fields of research. Bioeconomy is one of the future concepts of an economy which, while based on renewable biological resources, also predicts economic growth. Starting from a growth-economic as well as knowledge- and innovation-economic perspective the contributions give an overview of different existing patterns and cases and describe the basic prerequisites for the bioeconomy transformation. Therewith, the volume is a resource for experts and newcomers in the field of bioeconomy giving insight into the life cycle of bio-based products, detailing the latest advancements and how to turn them into economic growth.

This innovative book sets out to rethink corporate social responsibility (CSR) in global value chains.

The global threats to climate, biodiversity and a healthy environment are mainly caused by the excessive use of non-renewable materials. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), in collaboration with the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO) and Unique Consultancy, elaborated a Global Forest Sector Outlook 2050 to assess the capacity of wood supply to support a sustainable bioeconomy. The report presents a business-as-usual scenario, based on the Global Forest Products Model (GFPM), and a bioeconomy scenario based on the impact of increased consumption of two wood products consolidated in the market: mass timber and manmade cellulose fiber. The publication assesses the market outlook for demand for primary processed wood products, demand and supply of industrial roundwood, wood energy, and forest employment and investments. From a deman-driven perspective, it discusses the actual forest resource base and production needs to supply future demand by factoring in the use of wood residues and enhanced productivity in the forest sector, as well as the influence of megatrends and policy objectives.

This book provides the first in-depth investigation of how non-timber forest products are an integral part of local, national, and global bioeconomies. While the plants and fungi that produce non-timber forest products are essential to the sustainability of forest ecosystems, peoples' food and livelihood security and sovereignty, and thus the bioeconomy, are often absent from bioeconomic strategies. Presenting a selection of empirical cases from around the world that engage with the bioeconomy and non-timber forest products, this volume reveals how essential these products are to creating a greener and more sustainable future, how to to better integrate them into efforts to transition to and expand the bioeconomy, and how such efforts can be supported and developed. Chapters analyse how and to what degree non-timber forest products promote sustainable resource use, generate employment, and contribute to food and livelihood security and poverty alleviation. The volume develops approaches and identifies interventions and policies to support the integration of non-timber forest products into bioeconomy strategies, including in national reporting schemes to provide recommendations for future research and practical implementation. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of forest and natural resource management, bioeconomics, circular economy and ecological economics more widely. It will also be of interest to professionals working in sustainable development and the forestry sector.

With contributions from a wide range of thematic areas, this book provides a diverse perspective on the contemporary environmental challenges of Brazilian agriculture. Assessing existing experiences of governance interventions, implementation of inclusive and sustainable production practices, as well as technical innovations, this edited volume presents the reader with a nuanced perspective on sustainable future pathways for Brazilian agriculture. In many cases, actors within the agricultural sector stand in a key position to address environmental concerns, which often has generated important breakthroughs and improvement of production practices. Drawing on contributions from authors within a variety of fields, this contribution presents a trans-disciplinary perspective on the problems and pathways through which multi-level interventions can lead to sustainable solutions within the Brazilian agricultural and livestock sector. This book hereby constitutes an informed and timely contribution to the important debates about Brazil’s potential role in confronting environmental problems. More broadly, this volume also sheds light on the process of agricultural transitions in the Global South, and how food security concerns may be reconciled with sustainable production.

Forms of embodied labor, such as surrogacy and participation in clinical trials, are central to biomedical innovation, but they are rarely considered as labor. Melinda Cooper and Catherine Waldby take on that project, analyzing what they call "clinical labor," and asking what such an analysis might indicate about the organization of the bioeconomy and the broader organization of labor and value today. At the same time, they reflect on the challenges that clinical labor might pose to some of the founding assumptions of classical, Marxist, and post-Fordist theories of labor. Cooper and Waldby examine the rapidly expanding transnational labor markets surrounding assisted reproduction and experimental drug trials. As they discuss, the pharmaceutical industry demands ever greater numbers of trial subjects to meet its innovation imperatives. The assisted reproductive market grows as more and more households look to third-party providers for fertility services and sectors of the biomedical industry seek reproductive tissues rich in stem cells. Cooper and Waldby trace the historical conditions, political economy, and contemporary trajectory of clinical labor. Ultimately, they reveal clinical labor to be emblematic of labor in twenty-first-century neoliberal economies.