Opportunities & Challenges in Bioindustrial Manufacturing: An Environmental Scan

In today’s world, it is increasingly apparent that dependence on external sources for materials that are essential to our economy can create significant risks to stability and, consequently, national security. Additionally, as countries continue to come to grips with the looming impacts of climate change, it is clear that actions to mitigate must be taken. For these reasons and others, recent federal and private investments in bioindustrial manufacturing are expected to result in seismic shifts in our nation’s bioeconomy. Innovations in fields like bioengineering, synthetic biology, and biotechnology are driving the development of new strategies for meeting the challenges of sustainability and national security.

Opportunities & Challenges in Bioindustrial Manufacturing: An Environmental Scan of Workforce Development in the Industry, examines the current factors that are impacting the advancement of a resilient bioeconomy and the workforce for the future.  Our research team consulted leading experts from this field to identify  current gaps and potential undiscovered assets that can contribute to improving the bioindustrial manufacturing workforce and increase understanding about the political, economic, sociocultural, technological, environmental, and legal factors that are changing the industry.