LAUSR

Abstract Bioeconomy is one of the main aspects of the Baltic Sea Region (BRS) Programme. However, at the national level, bioeconomy strategies are still under development in several countries. As environmental aspects are particularly important to ensure the sustainability of bioeconomy, the aim of this paper is to analyse changes in consumption- and production-based bio-resource, land and water footprints for the period of 2011–2015 and couple them with economic indicators, to assess the efficiency of bioeconomy in the BSR countries. The results show significant differences in consumption- and production-based bio-resource, land and water footprints among the BSR countries; these differences are not linked to the existence of bioeconomy strategies in these countries. Taking into account a sustainable level of bio-resource, cropland and water use commitments, countries should develop their bioeconomy giving due consideration to the sustainability of resource use, whereas in all the BSR countries these targets are significantly exceeded. The analysis of the efficiency of bioeconomy also revealed significant differences in bio-resource productivity and land and water intensity among countries. From a sustainable development perspective, we can positively see that in all the BSR countries, bio-resource productivity increased and water footprint intensity reduced. The most positive changes were observed in Poland. Meanwhile, in Estonia and Finland, the increase in land footprint during the study period was observed. Thus, these countries should pay particular attention to efficiency improvements in forest and agricultural sectors. This study contributes to setting targets for bioeconomy policy in the BSR and reveals the main tendencies and challenges of the implementation of bioeconomy.