The funded projects will cover research into specific bio-based materials with potential to replace fossil fuels and materials based on them. They also include an industrial-scale flagship project that will use oil crops such as cardoon, grown on arid and marginal lands, for the extraction of vegetable oils. These will then be converted into bio-products such as biolubricants, cosmetics, and bioplastics, and by- products from the process will be used to produce energy, animal feed and chemicals.