Jordi Carbonell, the Special Commissioner for the Agri-Food Strategic Project for Economic Recovery and Transformation (PERTE) of the Ministry of Industry and Tourism, visited the Eurecat Reus technology centre this Monday where he learned about its biotech facilities and labs and the innovation projects it is undertaking in conjunction with businesses to drive innovation in the agri-food industry.
Jordi Carbonell noted the Ministry of Industry’s interest “in getting first-hand knowledge of technology centres like Eurecat because we have many businesses in the agri-food sector and we need centres which help them to innovate in new ways of doing things, new processes and new products to ensure we have a food industry that can compete with the industry in the rest of the world.”
He pointed out that this calls for instruments such as the PERTEs, which support research and innovation in companies to “roll out new innovation projects in product upgrading, cutting energy costs and digitalisation.”
The first Agri-Food PERTE call for proposals approved projects from 260 businesses, almost 90 percent of which are SMEs, worth €170 million and with 20 percent in Catalonia, while a total of 380 companies have submitted bids for the second call which is currently under assessment.
“These financing instruments help businesses to mitigate risk in their innovation process where Eurecat supports them in areas such as harnessing artificial intelligence to enhance processes, food science and technology with technologies including fermentation, energy saving and robotics both in the field and in the factory,” says Carol Benedí, Eurecat’s business manager for the Food Market.
Likewise, in biotechnology applied to the agri-food sector “the technology centre helps companies in designing and obtaining new ingredients, nutraceuticals and functional foods and validating their health effects to ensure they can get to market faster while recovering by-products to achieve zero waste,” adds Antoni Caimari, director of Eurecat’s Biotechnology Area. “Plus tapping omic sciences enables us to pinpoint the mechanisms of action of these ingredients and foods and help set up biotech-based strategies to enhance agricultural output.”
During the visit, Caimari showed the Commissioner the innovative technologies Eurecat is implementing to drive biotech knowledge and innovation transfer to the agri-food ecosystem. Many of these projects have been run in conjunction with agri-food companies both in the Tarragona area and also throughout Catalonia and Spain.
The meeting with the Special Commissioner for the Agri-Food PERTE was additionally attended by Núria Canela, director of Eurecat’s Omic Sciences Unit, and Ignasi Papell, Eurecat’s regional manager for Southern Catalonia.
Eurecat delivers biotechnology services to companies in areas such as preclinical and clinical services applied to nutrition, food and health. Conducting studies with preclinical models is essential to provide service to agri-food enterprises across the value chain involved in bringing a new ingredient, nutraceutical or functional food to market. These studies are the first step in accurately determining the health effects of these ingredients, the mechanism of action and identifying health and bioavailability biomarkers drawing on classical biochemistry, molecular biology and omic sciences. The results then have to be validated in human intervention studies.
Eurecat, which is licensed as a health centre, has all the equipment and professionals needed to perform all stages of clinical studies in their entirety. The technology centre supports food industries in validating their food, cosmetic or nutraceutical products for marketing and ensuring compliance with the regulations of each country of destination. These studies make it possible to scientifically demonstrate the expected effects of the products on health, furnishing robust evidence of their functionality and distinctiveness in the market.
The visit also took in the cutting-edge infrastructures at the Centre for Omic Sciences, a joint Rovira i Virgili University and Eurecat unit classified as a Unique Scientific and Technical Infrastructure (ICTS) by the Ministry of Science and Innovation. This centre taps advanced genomics, proteomics and metabolomics techniques to deliver innovative solutions to the food sector including fraud prevention, ensuring the authenticity and quality of products; detailed characterisation to enhance their traceability and safety; analysis of the impact of climate change on agricultural soils to optimise production and sustainability; and validation of the behaviour of products during their commercial life and shipping, assuring their stability and quality until they reach the end consumer.
