POLICY WORKSHOP in Brussels

European Parliament, 17th May 2018

July

25

2018

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In an extended European Policy Workshop on “Agro-residuals at the crossroads towards 2030”, held on Thursday, May 17, 2018, uP_running partners transferred their experience of demonstrations and trial applications of Agrarian Pruning and Plantation Removal (APPR) mobilization and highlighted the high potential and interesting opportunities these woody residues may offer. The aim was also to present uP_running policy guidelines to attendees and recommend them to include APPR biomass utilization both in the development of National Renewable Energy Policies (NREP) and in the Common Agricultural Policy  (CAP).

On the 17th of May 2018 the Croatian Chamber of Agriculture together with partners of the uP_running project organized a workshop with the support of the Croatian member in the European Parliament, Marijana Petir, together with Italian member in the European Parliament Paolo de Castro, and hosted representatives of the European Commission, colleagues and representatives in the European Parliament.

The Policy Workshop event has represented the place to make producers, researchers and policy-makers interact and exchange ideas on new ways to exploit agro residue biomass as one of the means to achieve the EU energy independence and the objectives of EU2020 Strategy.
Number of attendees was 39, mainly policy makers from different EU institutions and countries. This workshop was the event where the finalized version of the strategic policy guidelines and roadmap (uP_running Deliverable 2.3) was presented to the main EU representatives, after a fine-tuning work carried out with the contributions of a large set of policy makers. A due mix of policies and actions supportive the bioenergy sector was proposed.
More specifically, the European strong potential of agro-residues through the case example of APPR biomass was presented in order to evidence how its use is connected and is an opportunity to rural development, bio economy and circular economy. APPR biomass can be utilised respecting air quality and sustainability, whilst contributing to the development and growth in agricultural and energy sectors. Interesting questions were asked and, even more interesting answers were given by the participants of all interesting parties (Copa-Cogeca, INASO-PASEGES, AEBIOM).

The interest of the members of the European Parliament attending the workshop and of the policy representatives was very high and the discussion finished with many concrete conclusions. The European Commission gave information that they would like to change direction and focus more on small and medium innovative value chains in order to build industrial heating plants.

The main messages of this event were:

  • Setting ambitious bioenergy targets
  • Fostering biomass mobilization and securing its supply
  • Favoring profitable and stable investments in the bioenergy sector
  • Simplifying and harmonizing administrative procedures
  • Promoting an intelligent and flexible financial support
  • Supporting industrial leadership and technological development
  • Phasing out from fossil subsidies through Carbon pricing
  • Targeting effective technologies, value chains and business models
  • Solid fuel quality standards, fuel flexibility, eco-design and retrofitting technologies

As a confirmation that our project has raised interest, is the invitation we received from the DG Agri and Commissioner Hogan, to present the project at a workshop to be held on September 2018, in the European Parliament. It is going to be a high-level workshop for policymakers at EU/ national levels with bio-economy strategy experts from all Member States on “Best practices in integrating the primary producer into the value chains of the BIOECONOMY”.

Attachments

Name Description Link
uP_running-Presentation-Policy-Workshop Policy Workshop Presentation
uP_running-Policy-Guidelines-Def Policy Guidelines
uP_running_INASO-PASEGES_Questions_17052018_eng Q and A
Policy recommendations agricultural residues_AEBIOM AEBIOM Policy Recommendations
uP_running-AGENDA of 17th May 2018_Brussels Workshop Agenda
INVITATION-EU-PARLIAMENT-uPrunning-17-5-2018-6 Invitation Letter

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