Project news Interreg 2 Seas project BioBoost launched
Nine research partners from Belgium, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom are working together to find new applications for the bio-economy for horticultural residues. In Flanders, ILVO, Inagro and Vives are participating. The project in question is called BioBoost. It runs for 3 years and began in 2017. On Thursday 21 June 2018, an initial stakeholder meeting for horticulturists and companies in Flanders will take place at Inagro, under the title ‘Agro-food residues: from great expense to income source’. Policy specialists and European companies will explain how they work together to improve the bio-economy in the horticulture sector.
The BioBoost project investigates what options horticulturists have to handle their waste streams and how they can valorize processed residues better than, for example, by simply composting them.
Horticulture produces large amounts of ‘green waste’ such as plant residues (stems and leaves), unsellable fruits and vegetables, for instance due to overproduction in some periods of the year. Currently, these residues are either thrown away, used for making compost, fed to livestock, or used as feedstock for green biogas. In the BioBoost project, the possibilities for higher-value valorization of horticultural residues and plant compounds are examined and brought into practice.
ILVO, as a partner of the BioBoost project, is contributing its expertise and network around valorization of green waste to fulfill the goals of BioBoost.
Bart Van Droogenbroeck (ILVO/Food Pilot): “In Flanders, we aim for a higher valorization of vegetable overproduction, class 2 tomatoes, zucchini, pointed peppers and cucumber, into processed food products or ingredients. The use of innovative processing technology offers several new possibilities. Low oxygen pureeing and fractionation of wet biomass is one example of this."
In addition to having the analytical capacity to thoroughly characterize waste streams (macro and micronutrients, bioactive components, etc.), ILVO has also used its experience in process and product development to create a maximum added value from the horticultural waste streams, with recycling towards the food supply chain as an additional goal. Because we want to include the insights, requirements, trends and actors expectations from the agro-food chain in all phases of the project, we invite all players in the agro-food sector to interact with the project partners. Will we see you soon?
Project: BioBoost - Accelerating biobased horticulture
Funding: Interreg 2 Zeeën programma 2014-2020
Term: 2017 – 2019
Partners: Inagro, Vives, Epping Forest District council (UK), NIAB (UK), Van Vliet Contrans (NL), Greenpack (NL), Knowledge & Expertise Center for Plant Materials (NL), Westland Municipality (NL)
