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New business opportunities based on grassland and green fodder present a promising avenue to realize the transition towards a circular and sustainable bio-based economy. Yet, such potential remains largely untapped and grass-based products and businesses remain a small niche in the global economy. To understand this phenomenon, this paper introduces and operationalizes a model to assess innovation readiness built around seven focus areas: technology, manufacturing, business, IPR, customer, team, and funding readiness with their own detailed "progress scales." We employ necessary condition analysis (NCA) to identify limiting factors and bottlenecks in actual business situations. Our results reveal that lack of consumer awareness, infant conversion technologies and paucity of long-term investments that support emerging bio-based businesses are the most limiting conditions for the growth of emerging grass-based markets. The present study advances our understanding of the factors that limit complex innovations in grassland systems. Focusing on necessary conditions in a coordinated way between practitioners and policy makers by giving priority to fostering positive awareness of bioeconomy businesses, developing conversion technologies, and improving access to capital is a recommended approach to foster emerging grass-based innovations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Grasslands, important agricultural land systems, are undergoing significant shifts such as intensification, abandonment, and conversion to alternative land uses in Europe, leading to biodiversity loss. Despite major efforts, the European Union´s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has been unable to halt the decline of grasslands and to appropriately adjust management intensity because implemented policies have not considered the heterogeneity of grassland systems. However, accounting for this heterogeneity is essential to increase the policies´ effectiveness. In this study, we used archetype analysis to identify recurrent patterns in the heterogeneity of farm configurations, using Germany as an example, that can help tailor policy instruments to specific regional conditions. By applying self-organising maps, we reveal nine archetypes integrating 16 farm accountancy indicators. Advancing archetype analysis, we discuss their dynamics (including their emergence, disappearance and persistence) between 1992 and 2019 at the level of federal states and interpret these dynamics in the light of CAP. For example, archetypes in the western federal states are dominated by small crop and dairy farms, while archetypes in the eastern federal states are more diverse, including larger subsidised farms and medium crop farms. Moreover, archetype dynamics in the southern federal states indicate a decline in small dairy farms and an increase in small crop farms, implying the loss of valuable habitats for wild species. Policy instruments tailored to such regional conditions could more appropriately halt this loss. These insights derived from agricultural land systems in Germany can enrich the debate about how to better tailor policy instruments to regional conditions to preserve functional grassland systems in Europe and worldwide. • Archetypes were identified in Germany from 1992 to 2019 using Self-Organising Maps. • Nine archetypes characterized grasslands of which six were persistent in all years. • Importance of promoting farm diversity within federal states to build resilience. • Valuable insights for policy tailoring to enhance resilience in the farming sector. • Similarities in grassland systems can support regional transfer of insights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]