EMPLOYMENT IN VS. EDUCATION FOR THE BIOECONOMY

Abstract

A number of employees is one of the basic indicators applied for identification of the economic relevance of an industry or an economic sector. Referring to nearly 18.6 million people employed in the 28 EU Member States within the bioeconomy in 2014, it can be stated that this a an economic sphere of significant importance in the European economy. The main aims of the study are to identify a scale of employment in the bioeconomy sector across EU Member States as well as to investigate tertiary education in bioeconomy based on the Polish experience in the Bioeconomy subject area group within the Euroleague for Life Sciences (ELLS). Data used included: (1) the data portal of agro-economics modelling – DataM of the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, (2) CAWI research among students of WULS-SGGW on their attitudes to the bioeconomy, (3) feedback of participants of the first summer school in bioeconomy coordinated by WULS-SGGW. Research results display that the majority of Polish students did not meet the term of bioeconomy generally as well as at the university. There is also one very important students’ comment which can describe their attitude: students of economic disciplines are not very much interested as they think that bioeconomy focuses on life sciences (bio) so it is not appropriate for them; students of different fields of life sciences are not very keen to study bioeconomy as according to them it focuses on economy (as in the name itself).