The overall goal of BE-Rural is to realise the potential of regional and local bio-based economies by supporting relevant actors in the participatory development of bioeconomy strategies and roadmaps. BE-Rural will investigate the particular characteristics of the selected regions at a macro level, as well as existing best practices and business models geared towards the bioeconomy. This higher-level analysis will aid in the assessment of the 'bioeconomy potential' of the selected regions. This work will set the foundation for the implementation of a series of regional Open Innovation Platforms to kick-start the co-creation process, bringing together key stakeholders from academia, policy, business and civil society to develop ideas and capitalise on this bioeconomy potential. Activities will include research & innovation capacity building workshops, educational seminars and webinars, summer schools, and Bio-based Pop-up Stores. Building from this, the proposed 'Network of Knowledge' will aim to share knowledge and lessons learned from the Open Innovation Platforms at an inter-regional level, further disseminating best practices, closing the information gap on issues related to sustainability, and increasing capacities of regional authorities and stakeholders.

REFEST is focused on the most promising scalable technologies with low CAPEX, easy to deploy and suitable to be installed in a broad range of traditional fishing ships to provide hydrodynamics, electrical power management, alternative propellers, solar electricity generation and propulsion (batteries), sensoring and digitalization, hull appendages and air lubrication. REFEST aims to achieve TRL6 – procedures and technologies to secure the reduction of fuel consumption and GHG emissions up to 40% reduction compared to the original design. The solutions proposed will be designed to ready to deploy in a broad range of small fishing vessels and they are characterized by a low CAPEX and OPEX requirements to significantly reduce the payback time). Ensuring upscaling of the proposed solutions after project implementation till 2029. The main innovations are summarized as follow: i) Innovative design by the use bulbs and spray rails that allow to improve hull hydrodynamics, to minimize the water friction and reduce external and underwater noise, ii)Recyclable thermoplastic composites for maritime applications, iii) Air lubrication systems, iv) Integration of multi-functional optical fibre sensors for hull fishing ships monitoring, v) Propulsion systems based on RIM drive solutions and its hybridization with current diesel engines, vi) Battery pack optimized to be used under cold weathers and with high percentage of reusable/recyclable components, vii) BMS, EMS, and PMS to maximize the energy consumption in the vessel, viii) Cloud-based Eco-driving software and ix) Low-weight and flexible silicon PV panels. viii) Three retrofit demo traditional fishing ships in North Sea (Denmark & Norway) and Baltic Sea (Lithuania).