Nova Scotia’s Bio Revolution: How Industrial Biotech Is Reshaping Our Economy

There’s an old saying in business: timing is everything. And right now, the timing couldn’t be better for Nova Scotia. 

We are entering a new industrial era driven by biology. Around the world, people are demanding more sustainable products, governments are pushing for cleaner industries, and investors are looking for companies that can help reduce carbon emissions.

This global shift is known as the bio-revolution, and Nova Scotia has quietly become one of the places leading the way.

The Global Rise of Industrial Biotechnology

Industrial biotechnology may sound technical, but the idea is simple: companies use biology – things like microorganisms, natural materials, and fermentation – to create everyday products. These products include biodegradable plastics, cleaner chemicals, advanced textiles, and even new kinds of food.

This isn’t a small trend either. According to a major report from the McKinsey Global Institute, the bio-revolution could create $2 trillion to $4 trillion in direct economic impact annually within the next 10 to 20 years.

Why such huge growth? Several forces are converging:

• Demand for sustainable materials: Consumers increasingly expect environmentally-friendly options.
• New tools in synthetic biology: Technology now makes it faster and cheaper to design new biological processes.
• A global push to decarbonize: Countries are under pressure to reduce emissions, and biotech offers lower-carbon alternatives.

In many ways, biotech today is where the chemical industry was in the early 20th century – on the edge of transforming everything from how we make clothing to how we produce food.

Some examples include:

• Biopolymers that could replace petroleum-based plastics
• Biomaterials with new strength, texture, or performance qualities
• Biochemicals made using microbes instead of oil refineries
• Functional foods and proteins created through fermentation rather than livestock

Why Global Biotech Companies Are Choosing Nova Scotia

A big part of Nova Scotia’s success comes from collaboration. The province’s growing industrial biotech sector is anchored by AscendBio, a partnership between The Verschuren Centre and Invest Nova Scotia. Together, they’ve developed assets and built an environment where start-ups can grow faster and more cost-effectively than they could on their own.

Over the past five years, AscendBio has supported more than 50 industrial biotech companies, making Nova Scotia home to one of the fastest-growing biotech hubs in Canada.

What makes Nova Scotia so appealing?

• A strong support ecosystem that helps companies de-risk innovation
• Access to specialized equipment that most start-ups can’t afford on their own
• Deep technical expertise in areas like fermentation and process development
• A business environment where companies can scale with velocity and capital efficiency – a major advantage when competing globally

In other words, Nova Scotia offers a unique combination of talent, infrastructure, and support that helps companies grow faster, smarter, and more sustainably.

How Industrial Biotech Is Transforming Rural Nova Scotia

One of the most exciting aspects of industrial biotech in Nova Scotia is that its impact is not confined to urban centres. Many of the most significant opportunities are emerging in rural communities, where traditional “waste” streams have become critical inputs for next-generation manufacturing. 

Materials such as lobster shells, forestry residue, seaweed, agricultural by-products, and food waste – once treated as liabilities – are now strategic assets in the deployment of transformational biotechnologies.

By anchoring production close to these distributed feedstocks, industrial biotech enables value creation directly within rural regions, strengthening local supply chains, supporting year-round employment, and increasing resilience in resource-based economies. This represents a fundamental shift in how rural economies participate in innovation: not as peripheral suppliers, but as core hubs of production, investment, and technology deployment.

This transformation is based on a simple concept: valorization.

Valorization means taking something that previously held little or no economic value and turning it into high value smart chemicals and materials. For example:

• Lobster shells can become chitosan, a valuable ingredient used in medical products, cosmetics, and packaging.
• Forest residue can become biochemicals, clean energy, or advanced materials.
• Food waste can be converted into high-value functional ingredients or bio-based products.

From fisheries and forestry to agriculture, this shift is offering new possibilities for rural industries by building a whole new industry linking commodity coproducts to manufacturing, health and environmental sustainability and reducing waste sent to landfills.

Since industrial biotech often relies on local feedstocks, many companies naturally locate their operations close to the communities that supply those materials. This means:

• New jobs created in smaller towns
• More diverse economies that aren’t dependent on single industries
• Stronger, more resilient rural communities
• Local innovation ecosystems that grow around these new opportunities

Nova Scotia’s combination of natural resources, research capacity, and practical industry experience has made it an ideal testing ground for companies working on the next generation of sustainable products. As more organizations discover Nova Scotia’s advantages, the biotech cluster continues to grow, bringing even more skills, investment, and opportunity into the region.

Want to learn more? Connect with Paul Richards or visit our AscendBio program page.