With global demand for biotech solutions to the world’s problems growing, expectations are the sector will be worth US$750 billion by 2025.
The report published by BioTech New Zealand analyses the sector’s impact across environmental, human, maritime and agricultural sectors.
The report has taken a broad OCED definition of biotech being the application of science and technology to living organisms or parts of them, to alter living and non-living materials to produce goods or services.
Report authors are pointing to all the key areas of agri-food, environment and health offering opportunities, leveraging off NZ’s already well-founded scientific research community.
Estimates are bio-refining of wood bark, for example, could be worth $1.8 billion, while the entire bio-refining sector is estimated to have a value of US$50 billion globally by 2024.
NZ is well-positioned, ranking fourth globally for innovation potential in the biotech field and the local industry is valued at $2.7 billion in revenue, generated by 211 companies spread throughout the country.
The number of NZ firms engaged in biotech research has doubled since 2009.
NZ has also been punching above its weight in developing new biotech capabilities. This country is ranked second out of 54 countries for the number of biotech patents filed, according to the Scientific American.
BioTechNZ executive director Zahra Champion says the sector’s success has most recently come from successful patent applications flowing from university research.
However, a problem the report identifies is the taxpayer-funded biotech IP already sitting in research institutes that has not been unlocked for commercialisation, a problem the Government has already identified.
“Part of the issue is that some of the industrial and environmental biotech requires some large pieces of kit to scale up outside of the lab, and the cash to do it,” Champion said.
She lamented the failure of a bio-pilot plant to gain government funding recently. It would have been capable of scaling up the refining of organic matter for trials of products including biofuels.
Champion says a challenge this year has also been the multitude of government funds offering money to researchers for many different areas, and the risk researchers miss out due to uncertainty over what fund is most suited to the work they are undertaking.
“It seems MPI is also trying to bring organisations together and to be a central body on this,” she said.
This also comes as newer and, in some cases, more controversial technologies like CRISPR-Cas gene tech start to present possibilities, particularly for the primary sector.
Other technology includes CAR-T technology that helps the immune system target and remove harmful substances from the body, including cancer.
She says there was greater need than ever for more discussion about GE research, and communication about the opportunities it presents for NZ.
Along with high profile innovators like a2 Milk Company and LIC, the report has identified some lesser known, innovative companies in the agri-sector that are leveraging NZ’s advantages of strict biosecurity and high-quality raw materials.
This includes Aroa Biosurgery, which has commercialised technology to improve the rate of healing in wounds using a bio-material derived from sheep tripe as a type of scaffold for wound repair.
Despite the opportunities for global growth, the report authors see a need for better visibility of the sector to the rest of the economy, and more capacity for commercial scaling of companies.
Agri-tech was the first sector to have a comprehensive Industry Transformation Plan (ITP), but Champion says she was mixed about how this would work for biotech.
“The challenge is that biotech goes across many sectors, so really it should be inserted into all the ITPs being done. I would suggest we have our own and link into those other ones,” she said.
Forestry is the next sector due to have an ITP released.
A lack of a specialised fund for the higher risk biotech sector has also been identified, with over half last year’s investments coming out of the US and Europe where specialist biotech venture capital firms exist.
Champion says she is also surprised at how many farmers are still unaware of existing biotech solutions, including bio-protectants for use on crops.
“I never realised how big a gap there is between what is out there and what farmers know about it,” she said.
“There is a big opportunity there to showcase farms that are using this tech.”
The full report can be read here: https://biotechnz.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/2020/11/Biotech-Report-2020_online.pdf
