01
Basic Introduction: A Green Alternative to Petroleum-Based Materials
(1) Conceptual Analysis of Bio-based Materials
Bio-based materials are materials derived from biomass or produced through biological processes. These materials encompass basic bio-based chemicals such as bioalcohols, organic acids, alkanes, and alkenes, as well as sugar-engineered products. At the same time, bio-based polymers, plastics, chemical fibers, rubber, coatings, additives, composite materials—and indeed, a wide variety of finished products—also fall within the scope of bio-based materials.

Currently, most of the bio-based materials commonly used are derived from renewable biomass sources such as grains, legumes, straw, bamboo powder, and wood pulp. These biomasses undergo biological conversion to produce biopolymers or monomers, which then undergo polymerization reactions to ultimately yield environmentally friendly chemical products and green energy sources—including biogas, fuel ethanol, biodiesel, and bioplastics. Moreover, through innovations in bio-manufacturing and biosynthesis techniques, we can also design and engineer biological systems to produce and obtain an even greater variety of bio-based materials.
Bio-based materials, an important component of China’s strategic emerging industries, have been officially incorporated into the new materials sector under the “Made in China 2025” initiative. In recent years, this field has experienced rapid development, with continuous breakthroughs in key technologies, an increasingly diverse range of products, and steadily improving economic viability. As a result, it has become a new hotspot for industrial investment, demonstrating strong growth momentum. The establishment of standards is crucial for standardizing the definitions, terminology, and labeling of bio-based materials; it is an indispensable part of the bio-based materials standards system and is expected to greatly accelerate the further development of these materials.
In addition, bio-based materials can be further classified in detail according to their product characteristics. Specifically, they can be categorized into bio-based polymers, bio-based plastics, bio-based chemical fibers, bio-based rubber, bio-based coatings, bio-based material additives, bio-based composites, and various products made from bio-based materials. Among these, bio-based biodegradable materials have attracted considerable attention due to their green, environmentally friendly, renewable raw material sources, and biodegradability—features that set them apart from conventional petroleum-based polymers and other high-molecular-weight materials. Bio-based fibers have already been widely used in multiple sectors, including fashion, home furnishings, outdoor products, and industrial applications, and are gradually entering a new stage of large-scale industrial implementation and commercialization. Meanwhile, bio-based plastic products have also gained widespread adoption and universal market recognition in fields such as packaging materials, disposable tableware and shopping bags, baby diapers, agricultural films, and textile materials.

03
Evolution of Process Technology: Three Generations of Technological Transformation has already gone through three generations of technological transformation.
The process technologies for bio-based materials have undergone three stages of transformation. Initially, development technologies based on grain crops and sugars dominated the field; however, this approach could potentially lead to competition for land use with food production. Subsequently, second-generation technologies emerged, using non-food biomass as feedstock—such as starch-rich economic crops like cassava and lignocellulosic materials—thus making more efficient use of agricultural and forestry residues. The third-generation technologies are even more advanced, employing biological cell factories to convert atmospheric carbon dioxide into bio-based materials. Although currently still in the early stages of development, these technologies hold tremendous promise for future bio-based carbon capture and storage solutions.

Industry Chain Overview: Widely used in multiple fields including engineering plastics and textiles.

From the perspective of the industrial chain, the production of bio-based materials involves multiple stages. At the upstream stage, technologies such as breeding and genetic improvement are employed to enhance both the yield and quality of biomass. The primary upstream raw materials include starch-based non-grain biomass feedstocks like cassava, as well as cellulose-based non-grain biomass feedstocks such as straw. The midstream stage encompasses complex processes including biomass saccharification, fermentation, and the synthesis of bio-based materials. Finally, these bio-based materials play a crucial role in downstream application sectors, such as engineering plastics, engineering materials, textiles, and coatings.

04
Market Size: National industrial support is driving rapid market growth.
In recent years, China’s bio-based materials market has shown a robust growth trend. Statistical data indicate that from 2014 to 2022, China’s output of bio-based materials grew steadily and consistently. In 2022, the nation’s total output reached 2.266 million tons, an increase of 1.418 million tons compared to 2014. Although the growth rate slowed somewhat from 2015 to 2018, thanks to strong government support for the industry and continuous improvements in enterprises’ production technologies, the growth rate of national bio-based materials output significantly accelerated from 2019 to 2022. Looking ahead, it is projected that by 2024, China’s national output of bio-based materials will reach yet another record high, potentially surpassing the 3-million-ton mark.
Bio-based materials, with their green production processes, environmentally friendly characteristics, and resource-saving benefits, are gradually emerging as a burgeoning industry. In recent years, China’s bio-based materials market has demonstrated remarkable growth momentum. According to statistical data, from 2014 to 2022, the size of China’s bio-based materials market surged from 9.686 billion yuan to 23.12 billion yuan, representing an impressive increase of 13.434 billion yuan. Examining the pace of market expansion, we can see that between 2015 and 2022, the growth rate of China’s bio-based materials market experienced fluctuating trends—first declining and then rising—from 8.6% to 16.04%. As China’s economic situation continues to improve steadily, numerous downstream industries that rely on bio-based materials are also growing stronger, which will further fuel the sustained expansion of China’s bio-based materials market and accelerate the high-speed development of this industry. Looking ahead, it is projected that by 2024, the national market size for bio-based materials could surpass the 31 billion yuan mark.

05
Competitive Landscape: Domestic industry leaders are primarily leaders in their respective niche segments.
Currently, China’s bio-based materials industry is still in its early stages but has already demonstrated strong growth momentum. This industry not only helps alleviate the crisis of depleting fossil resources but also serves as a crucial pillar for China’s transition to a low-carbon economy. With the continued support of national policies, an increasing number of enterprises are entering the bio-based materials sector.

From the perspective of the domestic market, the bio-based materials industry has already established a highly competitive market structure with an extremely high degree of marketization. Currently, leading companies in various sub-sectors have emerged and firmly established themselves in the domestic market, while also actively expanding into international markets in an effort to build stable competitive advantages on a global scale. After a long period of market competition and refinement, influential leading enterprises and well-known brands have emerged in all mainstream product categories within the industry.
With the rapid development of the domestic bio-based materials industry, the technical, financial, R&D, and market barriers facing this sector are steadily increasing. At the same time, many key enterprises are actively expanding their business footprints, striving to capture a larger share in the fiercely competitive market. Looking ahead, the market concentration in China’s bio-based materials industry is expected to further increase.

06
Trend development: The trend of bio-based materials replacing fossil-based raw materials is becoming increasingly evident, and non-food bio-based materials are seen as the industry’s rising stars.

(1) The demand for bio-based materials to replace fossil-based raw materials will continue to grow.

As global climate change and environmental issues become increasingly severe, humanity’s reliance on fossil resources is gradually diminishing. Against the backdrop of a low-carbon economy, bio-based materials—thanks to their low-carbon, environmentally friendly, and resource-efficient characteristics—are increasingly emerging as an ideal alternative to fossil-based raw materials. The support from national policies and financial backing have further accelerated advancements in bio-based material production processes, expanded product diversity, and driven breakthroughs in industrialization technologies. Today, bio-based materials are widely used across multiple industries, including biomedical materials, packaging materials, apparel, home furnishings, industrial applications, and disposable products. Looking ahead, China’s bio-based materials industry is poised to unlock even greater development potential, with its application scope expanding into more sectors and its substitution rate for fossil-based raw materials continuing to rise.

(2) Non-grain bio-based materials are becoming a new focus of industry development.

Developing non-grain bio-based materials not only effectively meets the material and energy needs of the people but also reduces reliance on fossil fuels, lowers carbon emissions, and helps avoid the dilemma of "competing with humans for food and with food for land." Therefore, non-grain bio-based materials are regarded as a key pathway for the petrochemical industry to achieve a green transformation, and they hold great promise for future development.
To promote the innovative development of non-grain bio-based materials, six government departments—including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology—jointly issued the "Three-Year Action Plan for Accelerating the Innovative Development of Non-Grain Bio-Based Materials" in January 2023. This plan aims to guide the bio-based materials industry, which relies on non-grain biomass such as straw and residues from major agricultural crops, toward achieving breakthroughs in innovation, strengthening the deep integration of biochemical engineering with traditional chemical engineering, and promoting comprehensive improvements in the performance, cost, variety, and applications of bio-based materials. The plan outlines several key technological tasks, including technologies for saccharification of non-grain biomass, alternative fermentation technologies for producing bio-based materials without relying on grains, and highly efficient purification and concentration technologies. At the same time, it encourages leading enterprises to take the lead in establishing technology innovation platforms and supports local governments in setting up distributed non-grain biomass disposal and saccharification facilities tailored to their specific regional conditions. Through these measures, the plan seeks to enhance the production efficiency of bio-based materials, reduce energy consumption and costs, and minimize pollutant emissions, thereby solidifying the techno-economic foundation for using non-grain biomass to replace grain-based feedstocks in the production of bio-based materials.

According to the plan’s requirements, by 2025, the non-grain bio-based materials industry will have established robust independent innovation capabilities, a continuously enriched product portfolio, and a green, circular, and low-carbon innovation ecosystem. By then, the technologies for utilizing and applying non-grain biomass raw materials will have reached maturity, and the competitiveness of certain non-grain bio-based products will be on par with that of fossil-based products. At the same time, a high-quality, sustainable supply and consumption system will also be preliminarily established. Through a combination of policy guidance, financial and fiscal support, and the refinement of industry mechanisms, the state will further promote the innovative development of China’s non-grain bio-based materials industry, positioning it as a key growth direction for the future bio-based materials sector.

For a major agricultural province like Henan, which boasts abundant straw resources, developing the bio-based materials industry holds significant forward-looking and strategic importance. Therefore, Henan is actively exploring an industrial layout for bio-based materials that is well-suited to its own development needs, with the aim of enhancing the quality, efficiency, and competitiveness of its agricultural sector.
Henan Province, located in the heartland of China, is a major production area for wheat and corn in the country. Its wheat output consistently ranks first nationwide, and its corn output has also secured a place among the top five in the nation, resulting in an abundant supply of straw resources in the province. However, currently only a small fraction of these straw resources is being utilized efficiently; the majority still ends up being directly crushed and returned to the fields or used inefficiently—for purposes such as animal feed and paper-making raw materials. Therefore, exploring technological models for the bio-based utilization of straw resources and developing related products are of great significance for enhancing the efficiency of Henan’s straw resource utilization, extending the industrial and value chains, and increasing farmers’ incomes.

Currently, Henan’s bio-based materials industry is primarily concentrated in areas such as Nanle in Puyang and Dancheng in Zhoukou, where the main products include L-lactic acid, polylactic acid, and their modified materials. Despite achieving certain progress, compared with advanced regions both domestically and internationally, Henan’s bio-based materials industry still faces challenges such as small scale, low productivity, and technological backwardness. To address these issues, it is necessary to strengthen raw material supply, reduce costs, and promote engineering demonstrations. At the same time, it is also essential to formulate and refine relevant standards and policies.

Regarding the development of Henan’s bio-based materials industry, we propose the following recommendations: First, innovate agricultural breeding technologies and improve land quality. By developing new breeding techniques and soil-improvement methods—such as gene editing and microbial formulations—we can enhance crop yields and resilience to environmental stresses. Second, explore new pathways for producing bio-based materials and chemicals. By using non-grain biomass as a feedstock, we can develop efficient and sustainable production methods that meet the demands of markets such as textiles, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and chemicals. In addition, we should also develop novel enzymatic conversion technologies to transform proteins and starches into high-value products. These measures will help drive innovative development in Henan’s bio-based materials industry.
In the field of microbial protein production from non-grain biomass, we can produce microbial proteins at food- or feed-grade levels through fermentation using biosafe strains, thereby providing protein nutrition for both humans and animals. At the same time, we are also exploring new technologies, such as enzymatic conversion of cellulose into starch. Through enzyme catalysis, glycosidic bonds are selectively rearranged, enabling efficient conversion of cellulose into starch—a starch that holds broad application prospects in high-end industrial manufacturing.

Moreover, the convergence of IT and BT technologies is bringing about profound transformations in the industrial sector. A new data-driven paradigm for biomanufacturing has already demonstrated powerful momentum in the biomedical field, and in the future, this paradigm will be widely adopted in industrial applications involving the development of non-grain biomass. This includes the construction of genome-scale metabolic network models for microbial strains, the acquisition of high-quality data, and the application of novel data-mining and analytical algorithms. These technologies will significantly advance progress in areas such as target identification and prediction, as well as guiding metabolic engineering modifications.