Background and scope:

The food production system is heavily reliant on fossil fuel derived plastics. This reliance spans both the early stages of the production process, for example in agricultural mulch, through to the latter stages in which food and beverages are packaged to enable food transportation, preservation, hygiene and safety, increasing the lifespan of foods and contributing to safety of foods and the retention of their nutritional content.

Plastic’s low cost, durability, and linear use with low levels of recycling is the source of numerous environmental challenges that impact whole ecosystems particularly at the end of life. These environmental impacts are further accentuated by coating agents and formulation additives that deliver a range of functional properties. These additives can in turn leach out into the surrounding environment including air, water, food or animal and human body tissues, in particular during biodegradation.

This Pathfinder Challenge aims to support ambitious interdisciplinary research that will lead to the development and production of sustainable nature inspired alternatives for food packaging and agricultural production such as, but not limited to, greenhouse and mulch films. These materials must have a reduced environmental impact, through design and production, while delivering the functional characteristics of plastics.

Proposals should look to bring forward ideas that span the product lifecycle from the development of novel sustainable materials, their design and production through to end of life, while maximising the time and extent of use. Abundant, naturally occurring materials that display properties to be optimized for food related applications with a reduced environmental footprint in production and enhanced scope for re-use recycling and biodegradability, including in extreme environments, will be encouraged.

Applicants are encouraged to develop synergies with relevant activities under Horizon Europe Cluster 6 Work Programme 2021 – 2022 and Work Programme 2023 – 2024, and its partnerships, in particular Circular Bio-based Europe Joint Undertaking (CBE JU).

Specific objectives:

The Challenge seeks groundbreaking proposals with the capacity to replace the use of fossil-carbon-based plastics from farm to fork and thereby support EU policy ambitions to move towards a more circular, resource efficient and climate neutral economy.

Proposals must seek to deliver nature-inspired sustainable alternatives to fossil carbon derived plastics and associated production processes. These alternatives shall be circular, safe and sustainable by design and allow for reusability, recyclability and full biodegradability. They must look to address one or more of the current uses of plastics in the food system (e.g.,agricultural mulch, food packaging), and utilise bio-based sources and raw materials such as:

• polymers extracted from nature (e.g.,cellulose, chitin, lignin, keratin)
• natural polymers (e.g.,microbial, fungal and plant materials), or
• synthetic polymers from biobased materials.

Attention should also be paid to consider regulatory aspects in the development and incorporation of chemical additives that can deliver high sanitary standards for contact with food. The additives must be formulated in a way to meet set of biodegradability criteria and the assessment of the ability of the products to fully biodegrade in natural soil and aquatic environments across the EU.

All projects must demonstrate at least preliminary evidence of an improved cradle-to-gate and cradle-to-grave lifecycle assessment, when compared to fossil carbon derived plastics and current additives. This lifecycle assessment must take account of environmental, social and economic considerations. The resulting materials and associated processes must over their lifecycle:

• Reduce energy consumption and the carbon footprint
• Reduce water consumption and associated environmental footprint
• Enhance biodegradability, compostability or reusability

They must also include one or more enhanced functional characteristics for use in the food value chain while minimising or potentially eliminating the harmful effects with a view to:

• increasing shelf life and retaining the nutritional properties of packaged food, and
• enhancing the productivity and functionality of agricultural films

This could include the use of smart functionalities in responding to environmental conditions and the use of biodegradable electronic features.

Projects with strong capacity for use beyond food and agriculture (e.g.,packaging for pharmaceuticals) will also be encouraged and prioritised.

Irrespective of starting point, the resulting outputs of the projects must be shown to be effective for their intended application with, at the very least, a lab-based demonstrator i.e., reach TRL 4 or above.

Expected outcomes and impacts:

The projects selected under this Challenge are expected to collectively provide a portfolio of environmentally friendly materials and use cases informed by availability , efficiency and end functionality. Further, funded projects will be expected to work together to develop a robust approach to measure the lifecycle impacts i.e., the environmental, social and economic consideration of the funded projects.

The successful implementation of these Challenge projects will lead to a paradigm shift in the food and agriculture sector. It will in the medium-term lead to the development of a new group of nature-inspired materials that are commercially viable, environmentally sound and support moves towards a more circular, resource efficient and environmentally sustainable economy. These will help the sector reduce pollution in soils, sediment, inland water and oceans, and decrease contamination of food, animal and human tissues with micro and nano plastic particles and leeched additives.