Actors and innovators in the circular bioeconomy: An integrated empirical approach to studying organic waste stream innovators

Abstract

This chapter addresses the need for a reliable way to identify actors in the‘bioeconomy’ and to take stock of the innovative activities they engage in, especially in terms of how these activities involve organic waste paths and the circular economy. The focus is on what the actors do, not how they are initially categorised. Economic actors engage in activities that they either directly associate with the bioeconomy or that can be associated with the bioeconomy via scientific activity. We have screened a comprehensive range of available data sources based on both more objective measures (e.g. patents or projects linked to the bioeconomy) and on more subjective links (e.g. affiliation with relevant interest organisations, or survey responses). This identification procedure yields a population of actors whose contribution to the bioeconomy can be linked to one or more measures, allowing us to say something about the population itself as well as the activities that the actors are involved in that contribute to the bioeconomy.