Apostolos Raftpoulos, chairman of the Union of Labor and Consumers in Greece (EEKE), discusses how the Biolexer Project can strengthen certifications to strengthen consumer confidence in bio-based products.
The European bioeconomy is evolving rapidly, and bio-based products play an important role in promoting sustainability and reducing environmental impact. However, consumer trust remains a key issue due to its inconsistent certification schemes with environmental claims.
To address this, the Biorecer project aims to strengthen its certification framework and ensure transparency, traceability and sustainability in the bio-based sector.
In this interview, Eeke’s Apostolos Raftopoulos shares insights into the importance of accreditation in the bioeconomy of Europe. He discusses how strengthening certification standards can provide consumers with reliable assurance regarding the sustainability, origin and ethical standards of bio-based products.
Raftopoulos also highlights the role of consumer associations in educating the public, promoting responsible policy, and fighting greenwashing.
How do you assess the importance of consumer authentication in the context of the European bioeconomics? Do you think the new standards can actually improve consumer confidence in bio-based products?
The surge in unclear or unproven environmental impact notices regarding the production and/or consumption of products and services has led to consumer skepticism and confusion in many EU countries, including Greece.
To face this, EU capacity authorities have adopted directives aimed at empowering consumers for green transitions. The directive blocks common environmental labels such as “green” or “eco” without supporting evidence.
The new law aims to increase the accuracy and reliability of labeling products and services, preventing suppliers from making unfounded claims about the environmental impact of products and production processes.
The Greece coalition of working consumers firmly believes that accreditation is essential in the European bioeconomics and its ecosystem.
They may provide consumers with reliable references to the sustainability, origin and traceability of bio-based products. Such certifications can serve as an institutional indicator that a product meets established environmental and ethical standards and thus constructively influence the purchase of purchase decisions and drive market growth for sustainable goods and services.
At Eeke, we are stumped by the fact that the complexity and variability of the bio-based value chain often leads to questioning existing certification schemes, particularly when they contain residual raw materials and waste.
Therefore, the Biorecer project to address these issues will seek to evaluate and strengthen the current certification scheme by introducing new standards in accordance with the EU’s sustainability goals.
It supports guidelines for proofing the sustainability, origin, tracking and traceability of biological resources, ensuring its applicability within the EU and, where possible, worldwide. By integrating new standards, certifications will more accurately reflect the sustainability performance of bio-based products and increase consumer confidence.
At Eeke, we hope that this improvement will increase the value added, usage and social acceptance of bio-based products. It also feels it will support the transition to a circular bio-based economy, which offers significant environmental and economic benefits.
The transition to a circular bioeconomy requires close cooperation between various stakeholders. What role does Consumer Association play in promoting consumer awareness and education regarding the sustainability of bio-based products?
Consumer Associations play an important role in promoting the circular bioeconomy in many complementary ways. a) education for consumers, b) approval of certification schemes, c) demonstrate support policies, d) promote cooperation among stakeholders. Their impact on the adoption of sustainable bio-based products and services is important.
Consumer Associations can play an important role in the transition to a circular bioeconomy in the following areas:
Consumer Education: Consumer Associations can develop, implement, disseminate and evaluate educational materials on the benefits of bio-based products, focusing on environmental benefits and impacts on sustainability. This type of education allows consumers to make rational decisions and drive a market shift towards more sustainable choices. Promoting certification schemes: By approving, implementing and explaining certification schemes, consumer associations can help consumers identify sustainable products and trust relevant suppliers. Further initiatives like the Biorecer Project are in line with the EU’s sustainability goals. These improved additional certifications serve as standard standards for reasonable consumer behavior. Promotion of complementary policy action: Based on their experience, consumer associations can define public policies that support the growth and implementation of sustainable practices within the bioeconomics. Their involvement contributes to expressing consumer interest in policy-making processes and structures, creating regulations that promote transparency and sustainability. Promotion of stakeholder cooperation and networking: Being an intermediary between consumers, industry and policy makers, consumer associations promote social dialogue and collaboration. This ensures that the consumer perspective organically contributes to the development of sustainable bio-based products and that appropriate information is spreading to the consumer.
The Biorecer project aims to strengthen certification and combat greenwashing. How do you think the Consumer Association can help businesses to truly adopt sustainable practices and not use certifications in misleading ways?
Consumer Associations are a tool to minimize consumer biomisunderstandings, commonly known as greenwashing.
Certification serves as the necessary tool to verify the sustainability and reliability of a product. This is to provide certification for products and services to ensure that product certification is given environmental and ethical standards.
However, the validity of the certification depends on the reliability of the authentication procedure used and the manager of the procedure. A weak or superficial authentication scheme allows suppliers to clean their products green and systematically mislead consumers.
The Biorecer project, which aims to assess and strengthen current certification schemes for biological resources in line with the new EU sustainability goals, ensures corporate accountability and transparency on behalf of suppliers and contributes to:
Ensuring truly sustainable practices: filling the existing gap between regulatory frameworks and consumer interest in all EU countries. They can also push their suppliers to adopt sustainable practices and not exploit the certification in a misleading way. Support for Integrated Certification Standards: Mobilize public support for the details and implementation of strict certification standards in accordance with existing and/or planned comprehensive sustainability standards, such as those proposed by Biorecer. By contributing to policy dialogue and standardization of processes, we can ensure that certification reflects truly sustainable production practices rather than superficial marketing items. Monitoring and Reporting: By actively and continuously monitoring corporate biopractices and reporting discrepancies between company announcements and actual environmental impacts, consumer associations can hold companies accountable for their performance. They can publish specialized reports and disseminating alerts to inform consumers about suppliers that practice greenwashing behavior and block such practices. Consumer education and awareness: Educating consumers on the importance of certification and how to distinguish between credible and misleading presentations allows consumers to make reasonable choices. Consumer Associations can develop a variety of educational campaigns and raise resources to raise awareness about the importance of authentic sustainability certification. Working with regulatory agencies: By working closely with regulatory agencies, consumer associations can contribute to improving and practical implementation of laws that impose transparency and accuracy on sustainability reports. Furthermore, their experiences can provide insights and facts that contribute to the coordination of actual regulatory frameworks in all countries. Promoting transparency and traceability: Encouraging suppliers to adopt transparency practices and effective traceability systems will enable them to test and validate sustainability announcements. Consumer Associations can advocate for the introduction and integrated use of advanced tracking technologies to increase the overall reliability of certification. Supporting Sustainable Consumer Choice: By supporting products and suppliers who follow functional sustainability practices, consumer associations can influence market trends and patterns. They can create platforms and certification marks that help consumers identify real-world sustainable products and thus promote ethical consumption.
As the bioeconomy continues to grow, strengthening certification schemes is essential to ensure consumer trust and market integrity for bio-based products.
By improving transparency, traceability, and sustainability, biorectors play a key role in enhancing the reliability of environmentally friendly solutions.
Robust certifications, informed consumers, and clear regulations allow the bio-based sector to flourish.
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