What is Bioeconomics?

Bioeconomics is a new field of study originated from the combination of biology and economics. The word bioeconomics was developed by Gary Becker in 1930 who was an American economist. What is Bioeconomics? In simple words, it is a new branch of economics where the sociobiological activities are used to give a briefing about the human behaviour. The Socioeconomic system is observed and studied in accordance with the biological world and the relation between the components is also studied. This has helped to reduce the gap between experimental biology science and numerical economical science and the two different cultures have been brought together in this attempt like resource economics.

Bioeconomics is a branch of social science which has helped to explain economic events better based on biological theories and happenings. Different organisms survive in nature, cooperating and fighting to utilize the available resources and they go on based on the theory of survival of the fittest. Thus the basic ideas of biology have been used to better explain the economic system. The basic teleology of any individual according to this theory is based on the genetic fitness of the organism. What has happened with Bioeconomics is that, the Neo-Darwinian theory of evolution has been applied to social and economic sciences. The natural economies is analysed as every organism in nature competes for the limited resources to survive and propagate in this limited environment.

Bioeconomics implication simply means that every living organism has to make use of its resources and environment to live. When the resources are wasted, this directly means that the development of life forms is affected. Nature lays certain restrictions towards extending and modifying human culture, and this can be studied only using Bioeconomics. The costs associated with this kind of overcoming nature’s constraints can be calculated using Bioeconomics and sociobiology studies.

The socioeconomic and biological systems interact in nature. The social and economic activities of living organisms bring about changes and impacts on the biological system. This gives rise to issues like global warming. These interactions are rather complex and has been found to cause serious after effects effecting humans. Bioeconomics studies are based on the better frugal and efficient utilization of the biological resources based on the socioeconomic environment. In these studies, humans have been taken as the dependant point and the nature as the constant. This kind of evaluation will give a proper economy-nature equation.

Unlike other forms of sciences, bioeconomics deals with treating nature as a source of ideas rather than a simple source for human needs. Newer ideas are developed which has helped to come up with harmless innovations, benefitting both the humans and the environment. The feeling of a cooperative bioeconomical individual has been developed out of bioeconomics.

In normal condition, a whole lot of onion is wasted during harvest and dumped as low quality. With the advent of bioeconomics, this onion waste can be now converted into high quality product and thus economic loss has been prevented and even saves the environment. The low grade onion is squeezed to produce its juice which is fermented to produce vinegar. The left over onion mash is composted and used as fertilizer for onion cultivation. This has many positive effects for human economics and the environment, thus creating a balance in nature.

This kind of bioeconomics approach can help to reduce the use of harmful fertilizers which eventually prevent many health problems to humans. This can also give healthy bio-organic foods. Towards the economic side, using the waste material means saving money and promotes sustainable agriculture. There are several other researches and developments made as a result of bioeconomics which aims to build a better nature, economic system and life in the world.