News

Just two more years of patience and then the time will finally come: we will be able to eat mussels and chips with real Belgian mussels. This is the result of long innovation project, to which Blue Cluster has gladly contributed.

There are many forms of support for SMEs wanting to focus on research and knowledge sharing on an international scale, but it is not easy to have an overview of all possibilities. Fortunately, overarching initiatives such as CORNET exist.

The concession of the first Belgian offshore wind farm expires in 2039. The operators must then restore the area to its original state. This nevertheless involves a lot of work.

Pollution at sea, in ports and in inland waterways is a major issue. The government has a lot of expertise and materials to efficiently tackle this pollution. Unfortunately, this is currently not being used to its full potential because everything is spread across several agencies.

Nothing is more typically Belgian than a tasty serving of mussels and chips. Unfortunately, we currently have to import those mussels from abroad. Good news: that will potentially change in the near future.

In the brand-new exhibition “Zeekracht: duik mee in de toekomst” (Sea Power: dive into the future), you can discover the various possibilities of the sea in an interactive way and see what the port of the future will look like.

The European Commission strives for a sustainable and circular bio-economy, as this is important to society, the environment and the economy in Europe. That is why the BlueBio Cofund was created as part of Horizon 2020.

Innovation and cooperation are essential to sustainable economic growth. The Provincial Development Agency West Flanders is strongly committed to this through ‘Quick Wins Factories of the Future 2021’. The aim of this initiative is to promote entrepreneurship and economic development.

The Coastal scan is an annually recurring event that combines a walk along the coast with interesting presentations related to the sea. The third edition took place on 18 June. This year, we stayed in the Ostend region.

The sustainable blue economy is booming internationally. In Belgium too, the importance of this sector is increasingly recognised. This leads to growing interest from policy makers.

Sustainability is more than just a buzzword to Blue Cluster. We are therefore actively taking steps to help our members move towards more sustainable forms of business and provide relevant instruments to do so. One such example is the CO2 performance ladder.

The world’s population keeps growing. That brings us to the question of how we can produce more food without putting an extra burden on the environment. Sustainable aquaculture may be a solution.