Category: Alt Protein

  • eu cultivated meat
    8 Mins Read

    Ministers from 13 nations are pushing back strongly against the EU’s cultivated meat policy and asking the bloc to rethink its novel foods regulatory process in the interest of safety.

    Some countries are resisting the move, but the EU could now revisit its legislation. Here’s what happened at the meeting, and what could come next.

    Over the last few months, there has been increased parliamentary activity in governments around the world, specifically focusing on banning the production and sale of cultivated meat. While there are multiple reasons cited, the most common ones found across the board pertain to the safeguarding of national culture, livestock farmers, and consumers’ health.

    This week, things boiled over. A delegation led by Austria, France and Italy – the latter two of which have already proposed a ban or gone through with it – presented a note to the EU’s Agriculture and Fisheries (Agrifish) Council meeting calling for a radical overhaul to cultured meat regulation in the region. This was supported by the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Greece, Hungary, Luxembourg, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Spain.

    Critics, however, have highlighted false claims made by the representatives of these nations, labelling the entire exercise as unnecessary. While the note only serves to set out a position and does not trigger any formal follow-up process, some believe that the EU might be considering revisiting its novel foods regulations anyway.

    What did the note say, and how was it misleading?

    europe plant based
    Graphic by Green Queen

    The note states that cultivated meat raises many questions, including ethical, economic, social and legal concerns, as well as sustainability, public health, and transparency. It calls for a public consultation process and a “comprehensive impact assessment” to assess the development of these foods, as well as drawing guidelines based on the regulatory framework for new pharmaceutical products (including pre-clinical and clinical studies). It also touches upon labelling, urging the EU to prohibit these products from using meat-related terms.

    “A transparent, science-based and comprehensive approach is necessary to assess the development of artificial cell-based meat production, which in our view does not constitute a sustainable alternative to primary farm-based production,” the ministers write in the note. They add: “We urge the Commission and all member states to take pre-emptive action against the monopolisation of food production and towards the diversification of primary farm-based food production guaranteed by European farmers.”

    Alternative protein think tank the Good Food Institute (GFI) Europe has pointed out that there are many misleading claims made by the lawmakers. One of them is about cultivated meat’s environmental impact, referencing a non-peer-reviewed, UC Davis study funded by the meat industry, which is “based on incorrect assumptions” and deviates significantly from existing literature. Its findings have driven a major misinformation campaign on social media. Peer-reviewed research has shown that when produced using renewable energy, cultivated meat can account for 92% fewer emissions, 94% less air pollution, and 90% less land use than conventional beef.

    The note referenced a 2019 University of Oxford paper too, when research on these novel proteins was “much less developed” and based on energy sources heavily reliant on fossil fuels. This contradicts the most recent data available, which underlines that even the worst-case scenario for cultivated meat greenhouse gas emissions is better than the “best” conventional meat production systems for at least the next 100 years.

    The ministers argue that cultivated meat does not have higher animal welfare standards, referring to the use of fetal bovine serum (FBS). But FBS is being phased out by companies globally, and hundreds of animal-free media already exist. Some FBS-free formulations have been approved for sale, like Eat Just in Singapore and Aleph Farms in Israel.

    Additionally, there were concerns about cultivated meat “being monopolised among a few large-scale industrial producers” and how that would affect small-scale farmers, but GFI Europe argues that these foods can be made by “companies of all shapes and sizes” (over 50 of the 160+ startups in this space are European), and can work alongside existing farming methods to diversify and strengthen our food supply.

    The delegates further questioned the EU’s novel foods regulatory framework, but it is known to be the most robust in the world, which is why companies have found it challenging to file for clearance in the bloc. Other European countries – namely the UK and Switzerland – are already assessing dossiers. And as for the call to regulate cultivated meat as a pharmaceutical product, GFI Europe labels it “nonsensical”, pointing out that it’s “a food that will be made in food production facilities, so it’s essential that it is regulated as food”.

    What happened at the council?

    eu agrifish council
    Courtesy: Romania in the EU/Twitter

    The note presented by Austria’s agriculture minister, Norbert Totschnig, made waves on the Agrifish Council floor. There was controversy even with the countries opposing cultivated meat, with Austria’s health ministry – which is responsible for food safety – noting that the move does not reflect the government’s position.

    Other countries voiced their disagreement too. In the same week, the Netherlands took one step closer to becoming the first EU nation to allow public tasting events of cultivated meat, its representative stuck his neck out for the novel proteins in the EU Council as well. “We of course understand the concerns with regards to the public health and the future of livestock farmers, but also at the same time, we are talking about how do we secure the global food security, and the world population as we all know is growing fast, and so is the demand for animal proteins,” said Piet Adema, the Dutch food quality and agriculture minister.

    “Therefore, we believe that it is important to support innovations that create production methods for animal proteins complementary to, and not as a substitute to, conventional sustainable production. So, more research is needed to ensure the safety and the lower energy use, and therefore, in the Netherlands, we invest in this research, and so I would plea to let’s also look at the opportunities of this development and not only see the threats.”

    Similarly, Jacob Jensen, the agrifood minister for Denmark – a leader in protein diversification – said: “We understand the concerns that have been raised under this item, but Denmark remains very positive towards the development of new innovative biotechnological solutions that could lead to new sustainable proteins. And, like the Netherlands, we believe that we must also focus on the upside, and therefore, we look forward to the biotech initiative from the Commission that will look into the opportunities.

    “We already have EU regulation on novel food in place. This sets a clear legal framework that is solidly based on science. Denmark sees no reason for hindering the development and marketing of cell-based products, as long as such products are safe and fulfil the legal requirements and as long as they are labelled in a way which is not misleading to consumers. If these requirements are met, it must then be up to consumers if they want to buy these products.”

    Meanwhile, Stella Kyriakides, the EU’s health and food safety commissioner explained that the bloc’s existing regulatory framework for novel foods ensures that human health and consumer interests are well protected in a functioning internal market.

    What happens next?

    lab grown meat ban
    Courtesy: Mosa Meat

    EU Commission vice-president Maroš Šefčovič had separately spoken about the need for a strategic dialogue on the future of agriculture, which was outlined by GFI Europe’s senior policy manager, Alex Holst. “As Commission vice president Šefčovič said, we need to ensure our food system is ‘fit for the future’, remains competitive and can respond to issues such as climate change, biodiversity loss and resource scarcity,” he said. “Cultivated meat can play a vital role in achieving these goals, and it’s a positive step that policymakers are becoming interested in developing a better understanding of this food.”

    Holst noted how EU countries have already made strides in cellular agriculture, questioning the point of this debate altogether. “The EU’s Horizon Europe programme and countries like Germany, Spain and the Netherlands have already invested in cultivated meat R&D, recognising its potential to improve food security, reduce emissions, and satisfy [the] growing demand for meat,” he explained.

    It’s curious that despite investing in cultivated meat, Spain was a part of the note’s supporters. There will be a focus on France and Romania too, as both have proposed bans on cultivated meat. But it’s unclear whether France’s bill will be debated or not, as it’s one of many such bills proposed by opposition parties. As for Romania, the proposal had been voted through by the Senate but is yet to be passed by the Chamber of Deputies.

    But Romanians have mulled over the subject, with the Economic and Social Affairs Council of the Senate publishing an opinion on it. Its report on the proposed legislation stated: “The statement of reasons does not explain why synthetic meat should be banned. It is not clear why it could be dangerous to consume this product for the health of the consumers. Moreover, it is not clear why lab-grown meat is considered lower quality than ‘natural’ meat, considering the benefits of meat outlined in the statement of reasons. Therefore, the ban added through Article 5 is excessive, and it is necessary to eliminate it or provide further justifications.”

    Meanwhile, Italy’s move to be the world’s first country to ban cultivated meat has been flagged as a violation of EU law, as the bloc is required to be notified to the EU Commission for comments by other member states. Plus, the country will not be able to prohibit the sale of cultivated meat produced outside Italy but within the EU, whose common single market enables the free movement of goods and services.

    But changes may be afoot for Italy’s ban. “The Italian Government has committed to updating the law based on any feedback received from the European Commission, meaning there is a legal and political requirement to make changes to the cultivated meat ban if needed,” Francesca Gallelli, Italy policy consultant for GFI Europe, told Green Queen. “We also trust that Italy’s scientific community and civil society groups will play a vital role in holding the government responsible and making decisions based on evidence-based research rather than misinformation.”

    Striking a similar tone, Julia Martin, cellular agriculture lead at ProVeg International, told Green Queen: “We hope it will be overturned. But we also hope that Italy will come round to seeing the huge benefits that Europe stands to gain from cultivated meat. The EU needs to support cultivated meat if it wants to bring down greenhouse gas emissions from the food system.”

    Austria’s representative eventually tabled the note, which will not lead to any direct legislative changes. But ProVeg said the EU Commission “has the intention to revisit the guidance for novel food applicants”, with Martin further noting how the bloc recently funded FEASTS, the first Horizon Europe project on the impact of cultivated meat and seafood: “These actions should serve to reassure member states that these foods will be safe for consumers and will serve a significant role in addressing the environmental challenges with intensive animal agriculture.”

    The post Here’s What Went Down at the EU Agrifish Council Meeting on Cultivated Meat appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 3 Mins Read

    Israeli startup Steakholder Foods has added a 3D-printed shrimp prototype to an expanding roster of alternative seafood products. The company plans to also introduce a hybrid version if costs allow.

    A month after unveiling the world’s first 3D-printed eel alternative, Steakholder Foods has gained another ‘first’ with its new shrimp analogue.

    The new innovation was created using precision printing on the company’s proprietary DropJet printed, which is designed specifically for fish and seafood analogues. It uses a shrimp-flavoured ink designed by its food tech team, and will hope to accelerate Steakholder Foods’ route to market.

    Pondering hybrid seafood

    steakholder foods
    Courtesy: Steakholder Foods/Canva

    Steakholder Foods, formerly known as MeaTech, plans to roll out its seafood portfolio – which currently comprises a cultivated grouper fish fillet (in collaboration with Umami Meats), and the 3D-printed eel and shrimp – to future customers in two potential forms. The first would be a standard 3D-printed analogue, while it’s considering making hybrid seafood (a combination of plant-based and cultivated ingredients) as well, if it’s able to scale in a cost-effective manner.

    “By unveiling a second new species of plant-based, 3D-printed seafood this month, we expect to position Steakholder Foods to sell and deliver its first DropJet printer in 2024, offering partners and customers a unique opportunity to benefit from the expanding global seafood market, while making the right kind of impact on the environment,” said CEO Arik Kaufman.

    Speaking after the unveiling of the company’s eel analogue, Kaufman hailed its 3D-printing tech and potential as a hybrid seafood product: “Such versatility could significantly boost profitability for food companies and lead the way to a shift towards more efficient and sustainable practices in the industry. This product exemplifies the broader possibilities our technology offers our partners.”

    It’s an approach vaunted by other entrepreneurs in the alt-seafood space too. Varun Gadodia, co-founder of India’s SeaSpire, told Green Queen in September: “We believe the category will be unleashed by the rise of biotech-driven solutions – [like] cell-based and synthetic biology – and aim to develop enabling technologies or solutions for hybrid seafood alternatives.”

    Steakholder Foods, which has previously also unveiled a hybrid 3D-printed/cultivated steak, expanded its business model last year to serve as a B2B supplier of 3D bioprinters and bio-inks for alternative protein manufacturers. Its tech can create structured end products – whether that’s plant-based, cultivated or hybrid – to create realistic meat alternatives.

    The importance of shrimp alternatives

    vegan shrimp
    Courtesy: Steakholder Foods

    The company’s decision to expand its seafood lineup with shrimp makes sense when you consider that shellfish represents a $68B market. And just last year, 7.6 million tons of shrimp were harvested globally. But shrimp farming is associated with a host of different issues. Crustaceans like shrimp account for 22% of the total carbon emissions from fishing, despite making up just 6% of all the tonnage landed.

    Meanwhile, a WWF report from last year revealed that illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing of shrimp and prawns amounted to potential economic losses of about $47M each year between 2015 and 2021. In fact, 26.4% of all shrimp fishing activities were potentially illegal and unregulated between 2016 and 2021.

    The seafood species faces climate threats as well. Scientists have warned that pink shrimp could lose 70% of their habitats in the Gulf of Mexico by the end of the century. Shrimp has also suffered from population declines, with with spawning population only an eighth of what it was in 1908. And there has been a collapse in Atlantic shrimp numbers too, thanks to climate-change-induced ocean warming.

    Steakholder Foods says its heavy-duty printing solution can help meet growing demands through high-volume, efficient and sustainable production, offering a scalable, eco-friendly alternative to traditional shrimp farming. The aforementioned SeaSpire is working on a shrimp prototype as well. Meanwhile, other players in this space include Vegan Zeastar (Netherlands), Thai Union (Thailand), HAPPIEE! (Singapore) , Lily’s Vegan Pantry, Plant-Based Seafood Co. (both US) and Boldly (Australia).

    The post Steakholder Foods: Israeli Startup Expands Seafood Range with 3D-Printed Shrimp appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • cultivated meat tasting
    5 Mins Read

    The Netherlands has launched an expert committee to evaluate applications for cultivated meat tastings, six months after forming an official framework for the same. Cultured pork producer Meatable has responded by submitting its dossier to the panel, and expects to host Europe’s first tasting of these novel proteins soon.

    Six months after the Dutch government announced a Code of Practice for cultured meat and seafood tastings, the Cellular Agriculture Netherlands Foundation (CANS) has launched an independent expert committee to evaluate companies’ requests to host public trials.

    This will be the final hurdle for companies hoping to give people a taste of their product, and would make the Netherlands the first EU country to make pre-regulatory approval tastings possible. The news has been welcomed by local cultivated meat players like Mosa Meat, Upstream Foods, and Meatable – the latter has, in fact, now submitted a dossier for the panel to assess the safety of its cell-based pork.

    “We are thrilled to see the protocol developed in consultation with the government is now being implemented,” said Maarten Bosch, CEO of Mosa Meat, the company that unveiled the world’s first cell-cultured burger in 2013. He confirmed that his company too will be applying for tastings of its cultivated beef soon. “The Netherlands continues to be a global leader in sustainable food innovation, even as others in Europe appear to be taking a step backwards at the height of our climate and biodiversity crises.”

    Upstream Foods CEO Kianti Figler called it “a pivotal moment” for the country’s cultivated meat and seafood ecosystem: “We are dedicated to revolutionising seafood alternatives through fish fat cultivation, and this initiative empowers us to showcase our innovative approach.”

    Ira van Eelen, board member at CANS, said: “Proud of the work we have done as Cellular Agriculture Netherlands to make it possible to taste cultivated meat not only in the Netherlands or the EU, but also in the place where it originated and all started.”

    How the cultivated meat tasting committee works

    lab grown meat
    Courtesy: Mosa Meat

    In July, the Dutch government worked with Mosa Meat, Meatable and sector representative HollandBIO to create a Code of Practice that would make tastings possible in controlled environments – those that are suitable for food preparation and inaccessible to the general public. It was created after a 2022 House of Representatives motion sponsored by members Tjeerd de Groot (Democrats 66) and Peter Valstar (VVD) requested the government to enter consultations with these companies on this matter. The motion passed with 14 out of 17 votes in favour.

    Under the Code of Practice, cultivated protein companies must include information such as the type of cells, animal origin, use of genetic modification, and description of the process (including growth factors, antibiotics, and other constituents). They also need to provide safety information too, spanning chemical and/or biological structure, limit values from regulatory bodies, an exclusion of substances with known or suspected genotoxic activity, and allergen risks.

    The dossier further needs to have details about nutrition, like microbiological status, amounts to be ingested, measured content values, and total amount per person. Participation must be uncompensated and strictly voluntary, and comprise adults with no known allergies or underlying diseases (they should not be pregnant either). Companies must keep a record of where the tastings are held, with how many people, and the recipe of the way the products are cooked.

    They must ensure the presence of an emergency response officer, and register any adverse events occurring up to two weeks before the tasting. All this is taken under consideration by the expert committee, which is comprised of a toxicologist, microbiologist, physician and an ethical expert. Approvals would mean a company can hold a total of 10 tastings, with no more than 30 participants each, over the maximum span of a year.

    Meatable’s hybrid pork to launch in Singapore soon

    meatable
    Courtesy: Meatable

    For cultivated meat producers, the hope is to finetune their offerings while building consumer awareness through practical education. The move puts the Netherlands on an exclusive list of countries that allow cultivated meat tastings, including Singapore, the US and Israel. Notably, these three are also the only nations that have granted regulatory approval for the sale of cultivated meat.

    It means that people in the Netherlands will be allowed to taste these products before they’re approved for wider sale, making it the first to do so in the EU. The regulatory process falls under the EU novel foods framework, and so far, there has been no positive progress on that front. In fact, a dozen countries are opposing these foods, with Italy already having banned cultured meat locally. Meatablle plans to apply in the US next, and is already in talks with the USDA and FDA.

    “The Netherlands has long been the pioneer of cultivated meat, which is further cemented by this latest development, and we thank the Dutch government, Cellular Agriculture Netherlands Foundation, and HollandBIO for their joint efforts to make this possible,” said Meatable co-founder and CEO Krijn de Nood. “We’re delighted that we have already handed in our dossier for approval and look forward to holding our first tastings in the Netherlands soon.”

    Meatable has already hosted tastings in Singapore, with two events last year for retail partners, government officials, the media, and other stakeholders. It has filed for regulatory approval in the nation as well, and expects to receive clearance soon and launch products in restaurants by mid-year. Its first offering is a hybrid meat product, developed in partnership with Singapore-based Love Handle.

    The company, which has raised $95M in total funding, uses a proprietary technology called Opti-ox, which allows it to eschew the controversial fetal bovine serum (Mosa Meat pioneered the non-FBS production method and published the results as open-source). Meatable uses pluripotent stem cells, which can naturally and rapidly multiply, doubling in just 24 hours. Opti-ox helps produce real muscle and fat cells that can fully differentiate in eight days – 30 times faster than it takes to rear a pig for pork on farms.

    While development is ongoing, Meatable’s last tasting featured pork sausages with 33% cell-based meat, and the rest plant-based. “Each recipe is like a puzzle, where all components need to complement each other perfectly. We will keep on working on this to make sure we have the perfect recipe ready for the launch,” Meatable COO Carolien Wilschut told Green Queen in October.” It remains to be seen what the final proportion of the product will be.

    Apart from facilitating tastings, CANS is spearheading various other initiatives as part of a €60M investment from the Dutch National Growth Fund (a €20B project overall), including a new education programme for students this year, and the appointment of scientists within InHolland, TU Delft, Maastricht University and Wageningen University & Research.

    The post Startups Celebrate Dutch Panel to Assess Cultivated Meat Tastings, as Meatable Files Dossier appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • future food quick bites
    7 Mins Read

    In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Oatly’s new partnership with Carvel, price fluctuations for meat and eggs, and rare labelling wins for plant-based companies.

    New products and launches

    French alt-meat maker La Vie is continuing its growth, with its new pea protein ham now available in the UK exclusively through its largest retailer, Tesco. It made the announcement with a delightful billboard.

    la vie ham
    Courtesy: La Vie

    Similarly, Dunkin’ has introduced its vegan doughnuts to the UK market, with plant-based alternatives to three of its bestsellers – Original Glazed, Boston Crème and Strawberry Rainbow – available in most of its 34 locations nationwide.

    Continuing in the UK, Aldi has launched its largest-ever vegan cheese range, from Cheddar alternatives and mozzarella to camembert and grated parmesan. The discount retailer has also introduced a vegan smoked salmon as part of its private-label Plant Menu range.

    Another company working on vegan seafood is Japan’s Nippon Ham, which is developing a plant-based tuna sashimi for foodservice, slated for an April launch.

    Speaking of which, Israeli whole-cut meat producer Redefine Meat is now available at more than 650 foodservice locations in 13 countries across Europe, including at Leonardo Hotels, All Star Lanes, and Compass Group.

    Likewise, Irish fast-food chain Boojum has introduced a Carne Asada dish for Veganuary, made using British alt-meat brand [MOCK]‘s mushroom and soy protein beef, and paired with a guajillo chilli sauce.

    vegan news
    Courtesy: Seedtrace

    For Veganuary’s campaign in Germany, meanwhile, catering service company Dussmann has partnered with Swiss alt-meat maker Planted and traceability platform Seedtrace, offering supply chain transparency of Planet’s schnitzel via a QR code. It will be available in 60 Dussmann restaurants.

    Also in Germany, Rügenwalder Mühle has discontinued its classic animal-derived Schinken Spicker ham as part of its commitment to increasing plant-based offerings. It says the move will free up production capacity for its meatless products.

    Elsewhere, US ice cream company Salt & Straw has released a Dairy-Free Decadence range as part of its Pints of the Month series, featuring flavours like Toasted Oat Milk & Cookies, Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting and Bananas Foster with Candied Pecans. Made with oat and/or coconut milk, they can be bought in-store or online.

    Another ice cream development: Oatly has teamed up with cult-favourite creamery Carvel, placing five flavours of its oat milk ice creams in more than 300 Carvel stores across 18 US states.

    harken sweets
    Courtesy: Harken Sweets

    For more American sweet treats, look no further than Harken Sweets‘ better-for-you, plant-based takes on the Snickers and Milky Way bars. Called the Nutty One and The Gooey One, respectively, they contain 75% less sugar and less than 150g of calories, and are available at  Fairway Market, Pop Up Grocer, Gourmet Garage NY, and ShopRite, and on its e-commerce site.

    In California, Langer Farms has released Apple Honey – only featuring apple juice concentrate and natural flavouring – alongside an Apple Butter SKU (an elevated applesauce), which are available online via its website and Amazon.

    Meanwhile, US plant-based manufacturer Franklin Farms has collaborated with Disney to feature Mickey Mouse on co-branded packaging for six of its products. They feature the Disney Check, a symbol indicating compliance with Disney’s Nutrition Guidelines.

    vegan disney
    Courtesy: Franklin Farms

    And Canadian vegan frozen meal producer Plant Up has added Butter Chik’n Bites and Shawarma Bites to its appetiser range. Its products are now available at over 650 stores, including Metro, Longos, and Whole Foods.

    Finance, manufacturing and corporate moves

    Californian alt-meat giant Impossible Foods has hired three women in senior leadership positions, with Elaine Paik and Emma Hutchens joining the C-suite as CFO and chief people officer, respectively, and Alexis Regan taking up the role of senior VP for sales.

    Dutch company Vion Food, which makes both meat and plant-based analogues, is closing a pig plant and divesting/selling off its ham brand, pig and beef slaughterhouses, and a pre-packing facility – all in Germany – as part of its sustainability strategy for 2024, following increased competition and African swine fever outbreak.

    Dublin-based Sea & Believe has launched its inaugural seaweed farm in Connemara, Ireland to develop ingredients for the food and skincare industries using a red Atlantic seaweed that is richer in protein than fish.

    In Austria, mycelium meat producer Revo Foods has unveiled an industrial-scale production method for 3D-printed foods, called the Food Fabricator X2. The 3D-printed whole-cut salmon maker is also crowdfunding to scale up and launch new products this autumn, and has already raised nearly €575,000.

    UK biotech firm Multus has raised £7.9M in a funding round and announced what it claims is the world’s first commercial-scale, cost-effective plant for serum-free growth media to produce cultivated meat and milk.

    Israeli startup Mediterranean Food Lab has nabbed $17M in a Series A round to scale up its solid-state fermentation tech, which can create flavour ingredients said to transform the sensory attributes of vegan food.

    Policy developments

    Marking a rare labelling win for the vegan industry, France’s Supreme Court has ruled in favour of the Nutrition & Santé Group, which was accused by the meat lobby of misleading consumers through meat-related terms on its plant-based analogues. (The French government, though, has previously proposed an unprecedented ban on these.)

    Yet another labelling achievement came from Chile’s NotCo, which appealed the ban on its NotMilk trademark in its home country. The brand is officially “NotGuilty”, with the Court of Appeals of Valdivia revoking the sentence and rejecting the anti-competition lawsuit filed by dairy farmers union Aproval.

    notco labeling
    Courtesy: NotCo

    In more animal industry backlash news, Bishop Burton College in east Yorkshire, UK has apologised for a Happy Veganuary post on Facebook and announcing it wouldn’t serve meat two days a week during January. Pushback from pro-livestock students and farmers has led to the idea being abandoned.

    Elsewhere, two months on from cutting prices of its own-label Vegavita range across all stores in Austria, Rewe Group‘s Billa has seen sales increase by 33%. Future meat and dairy analogues will now be set at a price on par with or, if possible, lower than their conventional counterparts.

    Speaking of prices, beef is expected to cost Americans more this year on the back of a large two-year decline in production. Cattle feeders face much higher prices for their cows as a result of the reduction in cattle supply due to beef herd liquidation.

    Similarly, egg and ham prices have soared in the US, with hikes higher than any other food in December, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ latest Consumer Price Index report. While eggs were 23.8% lower than the ‘eggflation’ 12 months before, they were up 8.9% from November. Meanwhile, raw beefsteak prices rose by 11.9% year-on-year, the second-highest increase in that metric.

    Research and accomplishments

    A study commissioned by LI Food, a Lower Saxony state initiative for food, has revealed that Germans often underestimate the climate and animal welfare implications of dairy, specifically cheese. But despite some scepticism around food tech, respondents were open to trying precision-fermented cheese.

    Similarly, a survey by precision fermentation cheese company New Culture revealed that four in five of respondents are willing to purchase animal-free cheese, of whom 80% were meat-eaters. Early adopters are happy to pay $4 more per pizza with the company’s cheese, but taste remains key, with 59% of respondents saying they’d avoid analogue foods if they didn’t taste as good.

    Wait for the sizzle! Berlin startup Zayt Bioscience, which upcycles fruit waste into precision-fermented fats, has released a new video showing just how loud the sizzle on its animal-free butter is.

    Meanwhile, vegan dog food brand Hownd has been named one of the world’s most ethical businesses by The Good Shopping Guide, receiving a rating of 98 out of 100 in factors like environmental impact, animal welfare and public record.

    Finally, the US Plant-Based Foods Association is overhauling its platform to prepare for a “pivotal” 2024, launching a redesigned website, a new digest and monthly newsletter, as well as a revamped members’ portal.

    Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

    The post Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Mickey Mouse, Price Changes & Labelling Wins appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • heather mills
    6 Mins Read

    British entrepreneur Heather Mills has secured a rescue deal for her plant-based brand VBites, buying the assets of the business from administrators for £1M and waiving nearly £5M of debt owed to her, a month after first announcing that the company was bankrupt.

    Just a month ago, VBites entered administration and seemed likely to end its 30-year run. But in a surprising turn of events, the British plant-based company is back on the map.

    Founder Heather Mills has fended off five competing offers to buy the assets of the collapsed business for £1M through her limited company Vegan Solo Consulting. As part of the deal, the entrepreneur has additionally waived £4.8M owed to her as a secured creditor, which will help secure a better return for all creditors, as first reported by the Grocer.

    “I was devastated when the company was forced unnecessarily, with three days’ notice, into administration,” said Mills. “It was agreed between both shareholders that we would always give each other three months’ notice, knowing the figures 6 months ahead set for the company, so I was doubly shocked that it went straight into administration, even though I gave viable solutions.”

    She added: “But I strongly believed the next-generation technology VBites had developed and the work it had done still had a huge role to play in assisting the transition of the food market to a healthier and more sustainable place.”

    Heather Mills relocates, rebuilds staff base

    vbites rescue
    Courtesy: VBites

    Founded in 1993, VBites brought in Interpath Advisory in mid-December after struggling with cashflow issues, fundraising and a drop in consumer demand on the back of the cost-of-living crisis. According to documents filed by the company earlier this month, the business collapsed with a total debt of £8.37M, with trade creditors owed £1.86M and its 84 employees owed over £415,000 (they are expected to be paid back in full). The company owed money to 153 creditors, from food suppliers and packaging companies to lawyers and energy firms – at least part of this debt is set to be repaid.

    Meanwhile, German firm Nature’s Richness Holdings (the new foods division of Pfeifer & Langen) holds 34% of VBites’ shares currently – it had purchased a 25% stake in 2021. Nature’s Richness was owed £2.5M at the time of administration, with repayment in full expected.

    Mills, who owns the remaining 66% of the company’s shares through her firm Seckloe, was selected as the preferred bidder by Interpath as her offer “represented the best overall outcome for creditors of the company in the circumstances”. The asset-only deal included the plant and machinery, stock, IP and social media accounts. But it didn’t secure the jobs of the 64 employees who were retained to help with the administration, or the 20 let go at the time of appointing Interpath.

    Some employees have since quit the business too, with CEO David Wood joining fellow British plant-based meat manufacturer MYCO as its chief in December. Mills said she was “not happy being told that many of my loyal and hard-working staff were losing their jobs” during the firm’s collapse. “I was cut out of everything,” she said. “This is why I have chosen to resurrect the company myself, at great personal expense, and take control of the operations, personally moving back to the northeast to ensure we are still able to make a positive contribution to the future of our global food economy.”

    Millshe has already re-employed 40 staff members, and has expressed hope to continue rebuilding the company’s workforce, as its factories in Peterlee, County Durham and Corby, Northamptonshire remain operational. “We agreed a rent-free period at the Peterlee property in the administration with the landlord [which is Duo Renovations Limited, also owned by Heather Mills], which was contingent on the transaction being executed,” said Interpath Advisory.

    “This facilitated the continuation of trade and subsequent ability to finalise a sale. As a condition of the executable transaction with the purchaser, Seckloe has agreed to waive the entirety of its debt of £4.8M in the administration, considerably improving the overall returns to creditors.”

    VBites turns over a new leaf

    vbites
    Courtesy: VBites

    VBites’ rescue is reminiscent of British alt-meat player Meatless Farm‘s story from last year – after announcing it was entering administration, the brand was saved by fellow plant-based meat player VFC. Since then, VFC has taken over pie manufacturer Clive’s Purely Plants too, before rebranding into the Vegan Food Group this month to expand its footprint as a holding company, with the aim of becoming “a vegan Unilever”.

    VBites has previously stated similar intentions, hoping to turn northeast England into the “Silicon Valley of plant-based foods” after buying the Peterlee site – a former Walkers crisp factory – in 2019. Last year, Mills rescued Boston, England-based meat alternatives manufacturer Plant & Bean too, but it was amidst VBites’ cashflow loss.

    In a statement announcing the administration, Mills had blamed a combination of “corporate greed and poor management”, increasing ingredient and energy costs, misinformation about the plant-based industry, the cost-of-living crisis, and the “current state of the manufacturing economy” in the UK. “It is unsurprising and inevitable that where profits are to be made, amorphous corporate entities will follow and unfortunately their practices too often undermine the entrepreneurial spirit, flexibility and agility of movement that saw plant-based entrepreneurs have so much success,” she explained.

    “There is too often a tendency to treat their investments as short-term experiments and opportunistic flights of fancy, embalm them in restrictive governance and then either walk away or enforce a takeover when the market hits a bump,” Mills added. “There is a balance – we need capital to grow, but it needs to be well-intended capital and it needs to be married with strategic vision and belief in a brighter future.”

    The 56-year-old criticised certain celebrities who have backed the meat and dairy industries, but “should take their responsibilities as influencers much more seriously” – actresses Aubrey Plaza and Queen Latifah have both come under fire for featuring in dairy commercials. “The plant-based industry needs to take a lead from the dairy industry in unifying its voice, but as a force for good and promotion of the facts – as opposed to a litany of lies and misinformation,” Mills said.

    “We also need to work harder to demonstrate the long-term profitability of plant-based farming and manufacturing to the meat and dairy industries. If you want to enter the house, you need the keys – and working with the incumbent players in our food sector is the only way to effect meaningful and sustainable change.”

    The UK plant-based sector has been hit hard: inflation made meat-free among the worst-performing grocery categories last year, with sales down by £38.4m, and volume falling by 4.2%. Despite that, it’s still Europe’s second-largest vegan market. And as the sector consolidates, some believe it could bounce back this year. With 140+ products in 28 countries – including vegan sausages, burgers, fish fingers and cheeses – VBites will be hoping to be a part of that.

    “We have already developed a version 2.0 of plant-based food – soon to launch – that we believe will be a market mover, and will help all of those people attempting to make a flexitarian or plant-based transition to achieve their goals more easily, both with variety and deliciousness,” revealed Mills.

    “Watch this space,” she added, alluding to the brand’s subtly new logo. “VBites is turning over a new leaf.”

    The post VBites: Heather Mills Rescues Her Alt-Meat Brand a Month After Entering Administration appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • cultured meat regulation
    12 Mins Read

    With 2024 tipped to be a landmark year for cultivated meat regulation, we look at how the industry is faring across the world.

    While some countries are stepping up their efforts to progress these novel foods, others are pushing to ban them altogether.

    After a year that broke a three-year-long regulatory deadlock for cultured meat – with the USDA approving the sale of Upside Foods and Eat Just’s cell-based chicken – we’re not even a month into the new year, and we already have a third company on the list.

    Just last week, Israel’s Aleph Farms became the world’s first producer to gain clearance to sell cultivated beef, after receiving a ‘no questions’ letter from the country’s health ministry. For many, it’s a marker of things to come for the industry this year, proving that there will likely be no further deadlocks – at least from a global perspective.

    Yifat Gavriel, Aleph Farms’ regulatory affairs chief, said after the approval: “2024 stands to be a landmark year for the advancement of regulatory pathways and commercialisation of cultivated meat.”

    So let’s look at how things currently stand. Some countries are really accelerating their efforts to advance cultivated meat regulation, while others are going completely in the opposite direction as legislators hope to ban the production and sale of these proteins. Here’s what’s happening.

    Forging ahead: Israel, UK and Asia-Pacific

    lab grown meat approval
    Courtesy: Aleph Farms

    Let’s start with the good. In December, Israel’s Ministry of Health issued a ‘no questions’ letter for Aleph Farms’ consumer brand Aleph Cuts, allowing it to market its cell-cultured beef steak in the country. The approval for Aleph Farms’ Black Angus Petit Steak is subject to meeting labelling and marketing requirements as well as the completion of a Good Manufacturing Practices inspection on its facility.

    It made Israel the third country – after Singapore and the US – to clear the sale of cultivated meat, advancing efforts to tackle food insecurity. The country has always been supportive of alternative proteins. “Three out of the first eight cultivated meat companies worldwide are Israeli. 15% of global investments in the field are allocated to Israeli-cultivated meat companies,” explained Alla Voldman, VP of strategy and policy at GFI Israel.

    “With its global leadership in cellular agriculture, Israel continues to push for greater regional integration and economic collaboration, which will be crucial for stabilising the region,” added Aleph Farms co-founder and CEO Didier Toubia.

    But it isn’t just Israel that Aleph Farms applied for approval in – it has done so in Singapore, the US, Switzerland, and the UK. The latter, which is home to at least 23 cultivated meat startups, is reportedly aiming to fast-track its approval of cultured meat via a bilateral deal with Israel. While it currently retains pre-Brexit rules and follows the EU’s stringent novel foods process, the UK’s cultivated meat sector is growing fast – British startups raised £61M in funding in 2022, which is more than the rest of Europe combined (£45M).

    Now, UK ministers and regulators are looking to accelerate the approval of cultivated meat to boost food security, ease the cost of living, and provide alternative, planet-friendly meat sources for a growing population. They intend to do so through a deal with Israel to boost collaboration on cultured meat, with the British stakeholders visiting Israel in 2023 to taste these novel proteins and see how the market is regulated.

    In light of this, the country’s Food Standards Agency recently launched a survey asking manufacturers when they plan to applications for cultured products, and what technologies they may be using.

    Meanwhile, there is positive progress in Australia and New Zealand too: the countries’ joint regulator greenlit Sydney-based Vow Food’s cultured quail as ‘safe to eat’ in December. It gave way to a six-week public consultation process, giving people an opportunity to provide feedback about the product. Following the comment stage, the regulator will continue the novel food approval process, with an aim to complete it between March and May.

    “Public confidence around the introduction of novel food categories is always a vital step in gaining acceptance,” said Simon Eassom, executive director of Food Frontier. “The ultimate success of Vow’s application will pave the way for Australia and New Zealand to take a lead in this exciting new era of food production.”

    Cultivating potential: Regulatory opportunities in Asia-Pacific

    cultivated meat regulatory approval
    Courtesy: Vow Food

    Another Australian producer, Magic Valley, recently revealed that it’s working closely with the Antipodean regulator on the compliance and safety of its cultivated pork, with approval anticipated this year followed by a 2025 commercial launch.

    Elsewhere, France’s Vital Meat claims it’s the frontrunner to become the first European startup to be approved in Singapore, the first country to approve the commercial sale of cultured meat. It will likely face competition from Dutch cultured pork producer Meatable, which is also expecting approval this year.

    Chinese and American regulators met virtually last year after Upside Foods was granted Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) by the FDA to discuss how the industry can move forward. A month later, the annual, China’s Central No. 1 Document mentioned a diversified food system of animals, plants and microorganisms – words similar in tone to the ones used by president Xi Jinping a year earlier, in a speech recognising the importance of alternative proteins.

    Speaking to Green Queen after the launch of the APAC Regulatory Coordination Forum in October, Mirte Gosker, managing director of industry think tank the Good Food Institute (GFI) APAC, said: “Japan and South Korea will likely be next in line among APAC countries to develop such frameworks, as both nations are proactively seeking input from industry groups to craft clear and efficient safety review processes. No timeline has been set for when this work will be completed.”

    The regulatory framework in Japan, whose prime minister Fumio Kishida endorsed cellular agriculture last year with plans to boost the sector to reduce the country’s climate footprint, will actually soon become more complicated. In April, the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (which will continue to oversee food safety) will transfer its food hygiene standards division to the Consumer Affairs Agency in April. It means companies must liaise with two agencies on regulatory conversations, but does make Kishida the ultimate person responsible for these matters.

    South Korea, meanwhile, prioritised the establishment of regulatory frameworks for cultivated proteins as part of the alt-protein guidance in its national plan in 2022. It has also amended the Food Sanitation Act to recognise cultivated food as an ingredient within the legal framework and in the scope of premarket authorisation.

    Going backwards: Florida, Arizona and Texas push back in the US

    florida cultivated meat
    Courtesy: Florida House of Representatives

    Having approved two companies to sell cultivated meat last year, the USDA’s stance on these proteins is pretty clear. Speaking at Tufts University’s Cellular Agriculture Innovation Day on January 11, the department’s undersecretary for research, education and economics, Sarah Baig, said cellular agriculture “really fits into USDA’s vision for the future of food and our agricultural systems”.

    She highlighted the USDA’s “sweeping action to tackle structural competition issues in the agricultural supply chains to create fairer, safer… ag markets”, and how” cellular agriculture R&D is really a key part of this entire work”. She added that to meet food innovation and climate goals, “we will need cellular agriculture”.

    But it’s not all rosy for cultivated meat, though. Despite global efforts to get cell-based proteins on consumers’ plates, politicians in some countries are moving to take them off the table.

    Look at the US, for instance, where multiple states are hoping to ban cultivated meat. In November, Republican lawmaker and Florida House representative Tyler Sirois introduced draft legislation to ban the production, sale and distribution of cell-cultured meat in the state. If signed into law, it would come into effect in July this year, with a list of penalties laid out for non-compliance.

    Violators would face a misdemeanour of the second degree, alongside a fine between $500 to $1,000, while food establishments would be subject to disciplinary action. The license of any restaurant, store, or other business in violation could be suspended or issued an immediate stop-sale order. The proposal also authorises the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to adopt additional state-specific rules, which would mean anyone looking to obtain regulatory approval for cultivated meat in Florida would require authorisation from the department.

    Florida’s bill came soon after Texas governor Greg Abbott signed a bill requiring clear labelling of plant-based and cultivated meat, seafood and egg products, as well as Nebraska’s proposed Real MEAT act mandating the word “imitation” on alt-protein.

    Earlier this month, Arizona followed Florida with two bills looking to restrict the labelling of plant- and cell-based meats and banning cultivated meat altogether. Republican David Marshall drafted HB 2121, where he called his proposal “a matter of statewide concern necessary to protect public health”.

    “The production and sale of lab-grown, cell-cultured animal products threaten to harm this state’s trust land beneficiaries and the highest and best use of state trust land, which includes the lease of state lands to ranchers for livestock grazing to fund public schools and other public institutions,” reads the bill, calling the ban “necessary to protect this state’s sovereign interests, history, economy and food heritage”.

    If it becomes law, anyone found violating the act would face a civil penalty of up to $25,000. But more notably, anyone whose business is “adversely affected” by the sale of cultivated meat can file a suit to stop the act and collect damages of up to $100,000 (plus legal fees).

    EU: Far-right politicians in France, Italy, Romania and Austria make cultivated meat a political hot rod

    italy cultivated meat ban
    Courtesy: AP

    If you think that’s poor, Europe is arguably worse.

    Italy, for instance, made headlines in November when it became the first country to ban cultivated meat. It followed a months-long process spearheaded by Agriculture Minister Francesco Lollobrigida and sparked by a petition by Coldiretti, one of Italy’s largest farming associations, calling for a prohibition of “synthetically produced food”.

    After half a million Italians signed the petition, Italy’s senate approved a bill to put the ban into effect, with 60% of senators voting in favour. It then submitted a notification to the EU stating its plan to prohibit the production and sale of cultured meat, but upon realising it would be rejected, the nation withdrew the notice and sought to ban the novel proteins without EU approval.

    It was successful in its efforts after the lower house of parliament approved the bill, which carries fines between €10,000 and €60,000 for each violation. Italy has repeatedly cited national heritage, threats to food culture, delocalisation, and human health concerns as reasons behind the move – but critics have called it unlawful.

    “The EU law also provides that technical regulations like this law must be notified to the European Commission before their actual adoption, allowing other member states and stakeholders to provide comments on potential barriers to the EU internal market,” industry association Cellular Agriculture Europe said in a statement. “The Italian authorities’ withdrawal of their [TRIS notification and today’s vote blatantly contravene the EU law.”

    Italy’s ban came around the same time that the senate in Romania voted to prohibit the sale of cultivated meat as well, proposing bans between €40,000 and €60,000. The bill would need approval from the Chamber of Deputies.

    This was swiftly followed by France’s Les Républicains party proposing a ban on cultured meat in the country, with a bill introduced in the national assembly hoping to prohibit the production and marketing of these proteins “in the interests of human health, animal health and the environment”, invoking arguments of going against French tradition and hurting livestock farming.

    “The purely utilitarian vision of food is, in fact, the opposite of French tradition, which sees food first and foremost as a cultural and social fact,” the proposal read. It added: “Replacing ‘junk food’ with another ‘junk food’ is not progress.”

    Another European country turning it back on cultured meat is Austria, which – alongside Italy and France – will oppose cultivated meat production at the EU’s Agriculture and Fisheries Council meeting on Tuesday. The delegations from these nations have written a letter to the EU – supported by the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Hungary, Luxembourg, Lithuania, Malta, Romania and Slovakia – describing cultured meat as “a threat to primary farm-based approaches”.

    Highlighting the lack of approval for cultivated meat in the EU, the letter states that these novel proteins raise many questions, including ethical, economic, social and legal concerns. The lawmakers also highlight issues with sustainability, public health, and transparency. Notably, the text cites a widely condemned, meat-industry-funded UC Davis study highlighting the apparent environmental fallacies of cell-cultured meat, and calls for “science-based information sharing” to “counter any deceiving greenwashing campaigns”.

    “A transparent, science-based and comprehensive approach is necessary to assess the development of artificial cell-based meat production, which in our view does not constitute a sustainable alternative to primary farm-based production,” the letter reads, calling for a “comprehensive impact assessment” and public consultation process on the matter.

    Challenges remain for cultured meat

    cultured meat eu
    Courtesy: Upside Foods

    While some countries are showing promise, the cultivated meat sector continues to face major hurdles. At Tufts University’s annual Cellular Agriculture Innovation Day on January 11, stakeholders highlighted infrastructure and manufacturing capacity as key challenges.

    Taking the example of South Korea’s Samsung Biologics, one of the world’s largest cell culture facilities, Yossi Quint, founder and CEO of bioreactor producer Ark Biotech, said: “If Samsung Biologics were to be running every single minute of every single day for an entire year, they would produce less cultivated meat than the average Tyson facility produces in one day.”

    He added that the facility’s current output would need to be increased by 10,000 times to reach equivalent production rates: “When you think about a 10,000x increase, it’s not about incremental changes. We’re talking about a revolution about reimagining what infrastructure looks like.”

    Quint explained that larger bioreactors, more readily accessible cell media, optimised filtration systems and bioprocesses, as well as automated production are crucial factors to help overcome this disparity and reach price parity. However, for manufacturers producing whole-cut meats, scaling up is harder as they require edible scaffolding material for structural cell support and enhancing nutrient and oxygen supply to the tissue.

    These scaffolds need to be integrated into bioreactors, which means they essentially become single-use vessels for each individual unit of whole-cut meat. “I don’t know any company that’s going out and saying: ‘We’re going to grow this whole-cut, 1,000-kilogram piece of meat,’” said Ryan Silvia, programme manager of cultured meat scaffolding R&D at MilliporeSigma. “I imagine what this all means is there’s going to be a scale-out approach, not a scale-up approach for whole-cut meat.”

    Additionally, some panellists noted that shared infrastructure and pilot-scale manufacturing can help companies improve capacities and reduce the amount of capital needed. “When there’s very capital-intensive infrastructure that we are thinking about building out, can it be done in a way that is more accessible or communal?” wondered Lily Fitzgerald, senior advanced technology manager at Massachusetts Technology Collaborative.

    Eric Schulze, the former scientific and regulatory affairs chief at Upside Foods who started his own climate-focus brand consultancy, touched upon the importance of funding too. “The name of the game is price parity or slightly undercutting conventional products. If we get there, it’s on, and we really have a real new food space race, and that’s exciting,” he said. “But VCs don’t want to spend money on putting steel in the ground, so we need federal loan guarantees for alternative proteins. The federal government has to form the triangle of academia, private industry, and the public sector.”

    Honing in on this, GFI president Bruce Friedrich said: “If the government gets the industry started then the private sector can take over, just like electric vehicles [EVs]… Elon Musk says they would have failed twice, if not for long-term low interest government loans. There is no solar industry, there is no EV industry, there is no biopharma industry, if not for governments helping the companies that can’t qualify for standard bank loans, giving them long-term low interest loans.”

    Among all these challenges is the regulatory aspect. It does feel like a landmark year, as Aleph Farms’ Gavriel proclaimed – whether that’s a good one or bad remains to be seen.

    The post Cultivated Meat Regulation: Where Are We? UK, Israel & Australia Forge Ahead, US & EU Fall Behind appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • forsea foods
    6 Mins Read

    Israeli food tech startup Forsea Foods has unveiled the first prototype of its cultivated eel, linking up with Tokyo vegan restaurant SAIDO to create dishes with the cell-cultured fish. It aims to launch the seafood product by 2025.

    Forsea Foods, the only known company working on cell-based eel, has created the first prototype of its cultivated eel. The startup has partnered with Japanese chef Katsumi Kusumoto, executive chef and owner of Tokyo vegan restaurant Saido, to create two traditional dishes using its cultured fish, showcasing its application and potential.

    Kusumoto and Forsea Foods have developed two popular Japanese dishes – unagi kabayaki (marinated grilled eel over rice) and unagi nigiri (a type of sushi). Now that the company has achieved a working proof of concept – which it claims features “the same tender, succulent texture and rich savoury flavour as real eel” – it is prepping for scale-up.

    cultivated eel
    Saido owner and executive chef Katsumi Kusumoto (left) and Forsea Foods’ cultured eel (right) | Courtesy: Saido/Anatoly Michaello

    Forsea Foods’ cultured eel will be welcomed by Japan

    Founded in 2021, Forsea Foods employs a proprietary method for culturing seafood, using organoid technology to create 3D microtissues comprising fat and muscle, which can mimic the functions and structure of organs. These spontaneously differentiate into edible cells, replicating the natural process of cell formation.

    Moreover, the cell lines can self-organise into tissue structures without the need for scaffold support. This simplifies the production process, eases supply chain bottlenecks for eel meat, and improves scalability. It also enables efficient and cost-effective production by significantly decreasing the reliance on costly growth factors, which will help Forsea Foods disrupt a $4.3B market and bring its eel closer to price parity with its conventional counterpart.

    The company, which won the Startup Pitch Hour Prize at the Asia-Pacific Agri-Food Innovation Summit last October in Singapore, has previously raised $5.2M in seed funding, and now expects to add to that amount. Partnering with Kusumoto helped showcase the potential of its product. “Unagi is an enduring favourite in Japan,” said the chef. “Its timeless appeal, however, is impacted by a growing awareness among the Japanese population of the need to take a more sustainable approach.”

    “Forsea is pioneering the fusion of traditional, high-quality Asian cuisine with groundbreaking technology to create the world’s first cultured unagi – one that will provide the consumer with a genuine seafood experience without putting further strain on aquatic life,” said Forsea Foods co-founder and CEO Roee Nir.

    The news will likely be welcomed by Japan’s government, with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida endorsing cellular agriculture last year and announcing plans to create a sector for these novel foods to reduce the country’s climate footprint. “We will develop the environment to create a new market, such as efforts to ensure safety and the establishment of labelling rules, and foster a food tech business originating in Japan,” he said.

    To that end, the government awarded ¥1.87B ($13.1M) to Tokyo-headquartered IntegriCulture last month, which has created a cellular agriculture infrastructure platform called CulNet and claims to have developed serum-free cultivated chicken and duck meat at a fraction of the cost needed for animal-based growth factors.

    vegan unagi
    Forsea Foods founders Roee Nir, Yaniv Elkouby, Iftach Nachman and Moria Shimoni (left to right) | Courtesy: Tal Shahar

    However, Japan’s regulatory framework will soon become more complicated, after the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (which will continue to oversee food safety) transfers its food hygiene standards division to the Consumer Affairs Agency in April. It means companies must liaise with two agencies on regulatory conversations, but does make Kishida the ultimate person responsible for these matters.

    A spokesperson for Forsea Foods confirmed that the company is communicating with regulatory authorities in Japan, as well as Singapore. Saido has already been serving vegan unagi to diners, and once regulatory approval comes through, the restaurant intends to serve the cultivated eel too.

    Are there any concerns about potential backlash from patrons over a vegan restaurant serving cultured meat? “Forsea’s co-founder Iftach Nachman is an ideological vegan… For him, cultivated meat is vegan,” said the Forsea Foods spokesperson. “We believe that the decision whether cultivated meat is vegan or not really depends on one’s opinion. We believe that there is a certain segment of the vegan population that welcomes cultivated meat as a means of overcoming the challenges of the traditional industry.” [Since it is made from extracted animal cells, cultivated meat isn’t usually regarded as vegan-friendly – for an ethical take, this is a good read.]

    The spokesperson added: “Saido is not only for vegans, but also for customers who come for excellent cuisine and new dining experiences.”

    Overfishing and pollution have left eels endangered

    Both Kusumoto and Nir touched upon a similar theme – the decline of conventional eel populations as a result of overpopulation and pollution. In Japan, which consumes over 70% of all eel catch, the fish has maintained luxury status, with wholesale prices reaching $40 per kg, according to one estimate (Forsea Foods predicts this to be $60 per kg in wholesale, and $250 per kg for restaurants).

    But eel consumption has declined over the last two decades, falling from about 160,000 tons in 2000 to just over 60,000 tons in 2021. And this isn’t just limited to Japan – in the EU, eel populations have diminished dramatically, decreasing by 98% from 1980, leading to an export ban on eels in 2010.

    This has resulted in eel becoming a critically endangered species, with overfishing, poaching, illegal trading, and breeding troubles all playing a role. Known as mysterious creatures, these fish undergo an unusual metamorphosis, with a breeding process that includes a 6,500-km-long migration to one of two spots: the Sargasso Sea (near the Bermuda Triangle), or off Guam. This makes captive breeding difficult, especially amidst elevating demand for the fish.

    The overfishing of eels, meanwhile, disrupts the marine and freshwater ecosystems they come from – these fish maintain a balance in biodiversity by preying on smaller fish, ensuring that no single marine species takes over the ecosystem. Eels, in turn, are a food source for birds like the grey heron and the great cormorant.

    lab grown seafood
    Courtesy: Anatoly Michaello

    This underpins the need for alternatives to conventional eels. While Forsea Foods is the sole company dealing with cultivated versions of the fish, fellow Israeli company Steakholder Foods unveiled a 3D-printed alternative in December (it plans to include cultured eel cells in the product at a later stage, if costs allow). And New York’s Ocean Hugger Foods and Japanese giant Nissin already have plant-based eels on the market (using aubergines and soy protein, respectively).

    Now, Forsea Foods hopes to launch its eel commercially in 2025, as it seeks strategic partners in Japan and across Asia. To advance its progress in this region, it has formed new engineering and food applications departments, and appointed a new business development manager in Japan. The company also views the EU and the US as rapidly developing markets.

    “This year, we will [be] working to improve process parameters in our lab and increase our scales,” revealed the spokesperson. “In addition, we are planning to conduct a few tasting events of our products, expand our relationships in Asia and launch our next financing round.”

    The Israeli startup’s unveiling of its cultivated eel comes a week after fellow Rehovot-based company Aleph Farms gained the country’s first approval for cultured meat, and the world’s first for cell-based beef. “It is great to see more geographies approve cultivated meat and, equally important, to see more types of cultivated animal proteins entering the market,” Robert E Jones, president of Cellular Agriculture Europe and co-founder of the Global Cellular Agriculture Alliance, told Green Queen. “Israel, the Netherlands, Singapore, the United States, and the UK have made early investments to build complementary protein ecosystems, and the dividends are now paying off.”

    The post Cultured Unagi: Forsea Foods Unveils ‘World First’ Cultivated Eel with Tokyo Eatery Saido appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 9 Mins Read

    As marketing experts, we know that consumers are not as rational as academic research leads us to believe. In 2024, it’s time to get unstuck and rethink our priorities.

    For the past decade, the alt protein industry has been focused on the holy trinity of price, taste, and convenience. While we’ve made huge progress on all three, there simply aren’t enough consumers showing up to the party. Many of our propositions will continue to fail unless we change our thinking. We’re calling for 2024 to be the year we shift our mindset and skillset to get us unstuck.

    On the face of it, price, taste, and convenience (collectively known as PTC) seem like sensible drivers of choice in food. Who wouldn’t want cheap, tasty, and easy? But research published last year by think tank Rethink Priorities shows they’re not nearly enough to explain actual behavior. As marketing and branding experts we have been trained to know real people are not nearly as rational as academics or structured research questionnaires will lead us to believe. 

    Why price, taste & convenience are not enough

    Think about it for a moment. Bottled water is a $300 billion category globally despite being indistinguishable in blind taste tests, potentially worse for your health, and sold at a 10,000% price premium to tap water. Aligning alt protein pricing with conventional animal products will not bring a flood of consumers knocking on our doors. Demonstrating value and justifying a fair premium will.

    Let’s look at ramen next, a $50 billion category globally. It has graduated from dorm rooms into kitchens and Michelin-starred restaurants not by imitating established tastes, but by introducing new ones with a few lucky cultural moments along the way. Attempting to imitate the taste of animal protein, down to the blood dripping out of our undercooked burgers, doesn’t help especially when it adds scary-sounding compounds to the ingredients list. We have to create an aspirational taste and cultural context of our own.

    Finally, the fastest growing segment in pet food – raw, fresh, and frozen – has reached $18  billion in the US alone despite being harder to find and a pain in the ass to serve compared to a bag of dried kibbles. Yes, we need to know where to get and how to use alt-protein. But food is also an act of love, and we will put in the effort when we really care.

    It’s not (just) you, it’s the ecosystem

    While some self-flagellation within alt protein is necessary – especially around the lack of marketing skills, the us vs. them mentality, and the echo chamber we operate within – the reason we’re stuck has a lot to do with the larger food ecosystem.

    In developed markets, and increasingly globally, a small handful of companies control the vast majority of products that go into our shopping baskets. However, they lack the incentives to disrupt their own categories.

    Yes research labs are experimenting with novel ingredients and well-intentioned incubator teams are conducting market tests. But when the time comes for country managers in charge to allocate their budgets, they will always bet them on the proven formulas that are sure to deliver their profit targets and company bonuses. Alt-proteins remain curiosities relegated to page 40 of the sustainability report at best or are quietly “deprioritized” at worst. 

    Perhaps even more important, and certainly much more ignored, are food retailers and foodservice operators who have the potential to be market makers. Yet they are largely sitting on the sidelines because nobody is bringing them a compelling category vision in terms they understand and can act on.

    The good news? Both food retailers and leading manufacturers we’ve spoken to have a genuine appetite for change. But we can’t rely on them to work out the answers that will give them the confidence to shift their portfolios by themselves. To get us unstuck we need to embrace a consumer-centric mindset and skillset that will get the ecosystem moving. Here’s how.

    Courtesy: The authors via DALL-e

    The five resolutions we need for 2024

    1. Stop thinking product, start thinking category 

    Here’s a harsh truth – the consumer doesn’t care about us. We like to think we build our market by taking people along a funnel from when they are first aware of us to when they become our loyalists, forever a converted advocate.

    The reality is that when a consumer walks into an average supermarket they’re faced with more than 30,000 items to choose from. People don’t think in products, they think in categories. They want to pick up some chicken for dinner, put a healthy snack in their kids’ lunchbox, or grab milk for their latte. It’s little wonder most shopping is done on auto-pilot. People’s brains don’t want to process endless new options, so they come back to what they grew up with – the meals they know they like.

    Think this doesn’t sound like you? Remember you are not your consumer.  Get used to the idea that you spend disproportionately more time thinking about what you’re eating and studying where your food comes from than pretty much everyone else on the planet.

    Resolution #1: Deeply understand not just your product or ingredient but the category context it exists within. Use these needs, beliefs, and habits to get people’s attention and serve them better.  

    1. Stop thinking rational, start thinking emotional 

    Thinking rationally takes time and energy. We make over 200 decisions just about food every single day.  Because we don’t have the capacity to think deeply about these decisions, it’s far easier for us to make quick responses to emotional cues.

    Advertisers trying to influence these decisions bombard us with thousands of messages every day. From the phone you check as soon as you wake up, to the podcasts that put you to sleep, it doesn’t stop. That’s why great advertising doesn’t make you think, it makes you feel. It’s why the infamous Got Milk? campaign worked, tapping into relatable moments such as running out of milk at breakfast time. Our brains call upon these emotional responses to make quick, intuitive decisions.

    However, the way the alt protein industry has tried to understand the consumer is fundamentally flawed because it engages them on a rational level, not a true-to-life, intuitive, and emotional one. Various studies keep telling us that around 90% of consumers say they would buy more sustainable proteins once they’re the same price, taste, and nutrition as the meat they buy today. Does that mean they actually will? Sadly not.

    Resolution #2: Stop spending time and money asking people rational questions that just confirm pre-conceived notions but don’t relate to actual behaviors. Uncover a deeper understanding of your consumers and test their emotional responses, so you’ll know whether the positioning of your product is going to resonate or fall on deaf ears.   

    1. Stop thinking niche, start thinking mass

    Impossible Foods CEO Peter McGuinness beat us to this one in his Adweek X conference interview at the end of last year. By talking to the niche – the small percentage of consumers who do pay attention, do think rationally, and deeply care – you risk “pissing off” the masses.  Americans eat on average 347g of meat per day. That’s the market for alternative meat proteins right there. If you categorise your market based on attitudes to climate change, animal agriculture, or worse ‘food technology’, you define a much smaller market and an artificial one at that. Remember what consumers told you in a survey is not true to real life.

    Marketers today are trained to ‘target the market’, not market to a target. That’s because brands and products grow through having lots of customers, not a small number of highly loyal ones.  Half of all Coca-Cola buyers buy the brand just one or two times a year. There will always be people whom our products aren’t relevant for, strong traditionalists, or those who simply cannot afford them. But largely you’ll find a huge market for the taking, almost half of Americans identify as ‘flexitarians’. 

    Resolution #3: Get the right marketing and consumer leadership in place to think big, just as you do with your science and technology roadmaps. To get to a wider audience you need deep consumer expertise that’s not easy to develop, but neither is cracking how to grow meat from animal cells, or making dairy without cows.

    Note: Please don’t think this doesn’t apply to you if you’re a “B2B player”. If you don’t lead and support your customers in this work, you can’t expect them to figure it out for themselves, and won’t ever get beyond working in the incubator lab with them.    

    1. Stop thinking parity, start thinking difference 

    Differentiation is something a good business person will spend a lot of their time thinking about. Identifying a meaningful attribute their proposition can stand behind and become known for. Take cars – they all get you from A to B –  but some are famous for safety, others for speed, others for style.

    The problem with parity is it provides no compelling reason for consumers to switch.  If our only difference is climate or animal friendliness we’re toast. These aren’t meaningful to a mass audience (despite what your rational research claims), so why would they change the habits of a lifetime? We either wait for consumers to become enlightened while the clock is ticking, or we find relevant points of differentiation in the category to stand behind today. Health benefits for up to 90% of South Asians who suffer a form of lactose intolerance or 86 million Americans who have borderline high or high cholesterol levels), and experiential benefits (taste, mouthfeel, hunger satiation) all have huge potential within alt-proteins. 

    You may be thinking, but what about Oatly, don’t they talk about being cow-free and sustainable all the time? Oatly began as a proposition for those with a milk protein allergy. The success in building brand awareness then came from aligning with coffee shops and baristas, providing a differentiated coffee experience in a distinctively branded way that made choosing Oatly a contemporary choice. The brand earned the right to then build upon a deeper purpose which is a lot of what we hear from Oatly today.

    Resolution #4: Zero in on a meaningful difference you bring to the world. Do it by spending time with consumers to immerse yourself in their world. If you don’t have the budget for ethnographic studies – find some friends of friends who’ll invite you into their kitchen and talk freely. Go through their fridge – what have they bought and why? What are they looking for when they buy meat or dairy? What are the things you could make even better, and what are the things they don’t want you could remove?     

    1. Stop thinking commodity, start thinking value-adding

    Chasing price parity builds a commoditised industry. Having a broadly accessible alt-protein category may be the ultimate aim to drive switching from animal to non-animal products, but it’s not how categories are created. Industries now regarded as commodities started as premium propositions, and they retain branded propositions within them to this day. The cream cheese category was largely built by the Philadelphia brand. Pints of ice cream didn’t exist until Haagen Dazs and Ben and Jerry’s exploded onto the scene, growing the category far beyond what bland flavors in big tubs were able to do.  

    Building demand requires creating consumer value. A collection of poorly branded, generic frozen “not-chicken” nuggets will not create a category, no matter how cheap they are. Once desire is established and products become a part of weekly shop and restaurant orders, then we’re ready for mass-pricing, private-label, commodity products. Just like the industries that have been created before us.

    Resolution #5:  Having a path to price parity is important, but building category value now is even more so. Find the day-to-day consumer problems where you can bring value and use them to disrupt your category. 

    The willpower to get unstuck

    Ever since the Roman times January, named after Janus the god of beginnings and transitions, has given us a chance for a fresh start. We make many resolutions for the occasion, but the ones that last follow a simple formula.

    Break down the challenge into smaller steps, like the five shifts we’ve described. Tell others that you are putting the consumer at the center of your thinking. Remind yourself of the benefits regularly. Reward your teams as you put thinking into practice. And track progress toward your milestones regularly.

    For our part, we will be continuing to beat the drum on ways to get us unstuck. We hope you will join the debate because we can’t let this new year’s resolution fail.

    The post Unstuck: 5 New Year’s Resolutions For Alt Protein Marketers appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • usda meat
    5 Mins Read

    In a strongly-worded, evidence-backed open letter, more than 250 climate, nutrition and food experts and organisations are calling on USDA chief Tom Vilsack to address the country’s heavy meat consumption as a climate mitigation strategy.

    In December, the US agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack was asked at COP28 if he had heard about meat reduction as a strategy to tackle climate change. “I don’t hear much about that,” he responded, adding: “I did hear about the important role that strategies for methane reduction could play in making the current livestock industry more sustainable.”

    Now, over 250 climate, health and food advocates are pushing back on the USDA chief’s comments. In an open letter addressed to Vilsack – spearheaded by the Center for Biological Diversity – experts point out the US’s signing of the Emirates Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems, and Climate Action, which included a pledge to “work collaboratively and expeditiously” to shift towards the consumption of lower-emission foods.

    The US and its meat problem

    COP28 was widely touted as the first food-focused COP, with a dedicated food day, a menu with two-thirds of food being meatless, and the release of an agrifood roadmap for emissions cuts by the FAO. That roadmap, which was rumoured to be encouraging a reduction in meat consumption in richer countries, didn’t pan out that way – at least not as explicitly.

    As the letter points out, the FAO’s plan reads: “High consumption of food products with high GHG footprints in some locations contribute unnecessarily to the emissions of agrifood systems… The issue is to know not ‘if’ diets should change – for they absolutely must for human and planetary health – but how to obtain these results.” But it also mentioned that low-income nations needed to increase the output of their livestock.

    The reality is that animal agriculture is highly detrimental to the environment. The food system accounts for a third of all emissions – livestock farming, depending on who you believe, is responsible for anywhere between 11 to 19.5%. Meat itself makes up 60% of all food emissions, despite only supplying 18% of the world’s calorie supply and 37% of its protein needs. But instead of reducing our consumption of meat, we’re set to be eating 14% more of it by 2030.

    food land use
    Courtesy: Our World in Data

    The US is a major culprit here – Americans eat over six times more red meat than the recommended daily intake by the Eat-Lancet Commission. And there is a climate disconnect here: 40% of the country doesn’t believe eating less red meat would help climate change, a number that rises to 74% for overall meat consumption, according to a separate study.

    These attitudes aren’t helped by the fact that policies are heavily skewed towards the animal agriculture industry. Livestock farming receives 800 times more funding than alternative protein companies in the US, according to a study that suggests the “gigantic power” of the meat and dairy lobby is blocking the rise of sustainable alternatives. And in November, when the US invested nearly $200M in 185 agricultural projects to boost the supply chain, there was no mention of climate change, emissions or protein diversification.

    Other research has revealed how veganism can cut emissions, land use and water pollution by 75% compared to a meat-rich diet. And if you were to look at it more pragmatically, even a 50% switch to plant-based alternatives to meat and dairy can reduce emissions by 31%, halt deforestation and double overall climate benefits.

    Scientists’ three key recommendations to the USDA

    That’s not to say that the US hasn’t recognised the value of alt-proteins – even if states like Florida and Arizona are pushing back. Last year, the USDA granted regulatory approval to Upside Foods and Eat Just for their cell-cultured chicken, a landmark move that made it only the second country to do so. It has also cleared the sale of precision fermentation dairy proteins from three companies.

    So, as the head of the USDA, it stands to reason that meat reduction should be on the agenda for Vilsack. “The USDA has repeatedly been urged by scientists (including its own scientific advisory committees), environmental experts, and public health advocates over the past decade to address excessive meat and dairy consumption in food and nutrition policy,” the letter states. “But the United States has fallen far behind other G20 nations in even taking the first step of incorporating sustainability into the national dietary guidelines.”

    us meat consumption
    Courtesy: Upside Foods

    Directly addressing the agriculture secretary, it continues: “Under your leadership, the USDA has instead relied on false solutions such as feed additives, which have minimal impact in reducing emissions and aren’t scalable, and biogas, which worsens the problem of pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. Improving agricultural production is only one piece of the puzzle, and ignoring dietary shifts in consumption creates an ineffective and weak climate response.”

    The signatories go on to outline three key demands from the USDA:

    1. Immediately make meat and dairy reduction a key part of USDA’s climate strategy by acknowledging the role of consumption in climate mitigation and identifying opportunities to support and incentivise dietary shifts.
    2. Align food and climate goals in all USDA programmes and policies, including by increasing access to healthy, plant-based foods in the school meal programme.
    3. Integrate sustainability into the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, with an emphasis on plant-forward dietary patterns.

    Jennifer Molidor, a senior food campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity, said: “Secretary Vilsack can’t keep his head in the sand anymore, because this letter delivers the message loud and clear. We have to address our meat-heavy diets now, or the climate emergency will force us to.”

    The post Scientists to USDA: Tackle America’s Meat Consumption, or the Climate Crisis Will Force You To appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • air protein
    5 Mins Read

    Finnish company Solar Foods’ Solein protein is expanding its footprint in Singapore through a partnership with Helsinki-based food giant Fazer Group, which has crafted a limited-edition snack bar using the air protein.

    Fazer has released Taste the Future, a chocolate snack bar powered by Solein, in Singapore – marking the air protein’s retail debut 16 months after receiving regulatory approval. The product is available at five The Cocoa Trees stores across the island.

    Fazer – which posted €1.1B ($1.19B) in revenue in 2022 and is Solar Foods’ biggest shareholder – hosted a media tasting of the limited-edition bar on Thursday, ahead of a one-time public sampling opportunity on Saturday afternoon at The Cocoa Trees store at Raffles City Shopping Centre.

    “Singapore is the perfect test ground for our Taste the Future Chocolate Snack Bar, with a highly innovative food ecosystem and people who are not only passionate about food, but curious to try new things that are new, with nutrition and sustainability benefits,” said Heli Anttila, VP of new product development at Fazer Confectionery.

    An iron- and fibre-rich vegan snack bar

    solar foods fazer
    Courtesy: Solar Foods

    The vegan chocolate, hazelnut and berry snack bar contains Nordic oat puffs and 2% Solein powder, and was produced at Fazer Lab, the company’s R&D and innovation unit in Vantaa, Finland. Free from palm oil, the product is made from “100% responsibly sourced cocoa” and is high in fibre and iron.

    While the flavourless Solein protein – made by fermenting microbes with carbon dioxide, hydrogen and oxygen replacing sugar as an energy source – had debuted as part of a vegan gelato at Singaporean eatery Fico in 2023, this is the first time it’s available as an FMCG product.

    Fazer and Solar Foods have been working hand-in-hand on R&D and product development. With the latter’s commercial-scale Factory 01 set to be operational by the first half of this year, the limited run proves to be a good test for this nutritious consumer snack bar’s future market rollouts, once the protein is in full production. This is in line with Fazer’s own emissions reduction goals and target for 100% sustainable sourcing.

    “This is an exciting moment for us working with Fazer – the very first time people can try Solein within a consumer snack bar,” said Solar Foods CEO Pasi Vainikka. “This also demonstrates the potential of Solein as a sustainable and nutritious fortifier. With this introduction in Singapore, we are getting valuable customer feedback on Solein’s viability in a new product category and also get a sense of the consumer acceptance of future ingredients.”

    Solar Foods targets 2025-26 European launch

    fazer vegan
    Courtesy: Solar Foods

    Solar Foods, which began in 2017 as a spinout of the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and LUT University, calls Solein the “world’s most sustainable protein”, with a production process that forgoes the need for open land, fertilisers and pesticides, and irrigation. It can be made in desert-like conditions, the Arctic, and even outer space (the startup has collaborated with the European Space Agency on a food project for Mars). The microbes are grown in liquid form and eventually turned into an orange-coloured dry powder.

    According to a life-cycle analysis, Solein emits just 1% of greenhouse gas emissions compared to conventional meat and 20% versus plant-based proteins. Plus, it has a strong nutritional profile, with 65-70% of protein, 5-8% of fat, 10-15% of dietary fibre and 3-5% of minerals, as well as a macronutrient profile similar to dried soy or algae. The microbial protein contains iron and B vitamins as well, essential nutrients that are often sourced from animal-derived ingredients.

    After receiving clearance from Singapore’s food regulatory authority for the carbon-capturing protein, Vainikka compared its development to the discovery of the potato. “We are introducing an entirely new ingredient to the world of food,” he remarked. “It’s a watershed moment for how we think of what we eat.”

    This potential has been realised by investors as well, with Solein nabbing €8M ($8.8M) in Series B funding in November to support the construction of Factory 01. It brought total investment in the startup to over €43M ($47M) in equity, with an additional €30M ($32M) in debt funding. The company also has a €34M ($37M) grant for Factory 01 and a further €76M ($83M) earmarked for Factory 02 “if we were to build on European soil”.

    solar foods
    Courtesy: Solar Foods

    It’s something Vainikka hinted at after the release of the Fazer Taste the Future bar, with its novel foods regulation process in the EU expected to finish by the end of 2025. “Our shared aim extends beyond this pivotal moment, targeting a wider-scale European launch in 2025-26 with a whole range of products.” And it truly could be a range of products – the ingredient has already been demoed in over 20 different foods, including burgers, eggs and meatballs.

    For now, though, a snack bar it is. The product will be available at five locations of The Cocoa Trees across the city-state, as part of a bundle offer until February 18 – customers can redeem one Taste the Future bar for every S$30 ($22) spent on Fazer products.

    Solar Foods’ Solein isn’t the only air protein – Kiverdi’s Air Protein (US) and Arkeon Biotechnologies (Austria) are working on similar products, while companies like NovoNutrientsCalysta (both Californian) and Deep Branch Biotech (UK) are producing such ingredients for livestock and fish feed.

    The post A Snack Bar Made From Air: Fazer Unveils Limited-Edition Chocolate Bar Using Solein appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 4 Mins Read

    Marketing expert Irina Gerry argues that while blended meat, could meet niche consumer needs such as upgraded nutrition or improved flavor, it’s not a ‘big’ idea.

    The concept of blended meat — combining plant-based ingredients with animal meat — has recently emerged as a solution to the challenges faced by purely plant-based meats. At first glance, it seems like a compelling proposition, promising enhanced taste compared to plant-based meat, reduced environmental impact versus animal-based meat, and potentially better pricing. Recent entrants into this space include brands like 50/50 Foods, Paul’s Table, and Mush Foods. However, does this idea truly address consumer needs, or is it merely an industry-driven solution?

    The Best of Both Worlds: Understanding Flexitarians

    The rise of flexitarian diets suggests a willingness to embrace both plant-based and animal products. However, this doesn’t automatically translate into a desire for blended products. Products like almond-dairy milk blend by Live Real Farms or mixed chicken and Raised and Rooted blended meat and plant-based protein burgers by Tyson haven’t performed well in the market. 

    The reason for this is the lack of a real consumer need. We don’t see consumers mixing almond and dairy milk in the same glass. They likely have both milks in their fridge, but use them for different occasions or different members of the household, based on a specific set of preferences. Similarly, we rarely see anyone blending a Beyond Burger with ground beef to improve the flavor.

    Quality Perception of Blended Meat: A Complicated Relationship

    The act of blending can create a perception of lesser quality. Meat enthusiasts often view pure meat as a high-quality product. When you start mixing in soy or pea protein, it’s like watering down a fine wine. Remember when rumors of McDonald’s burger patties getting mixed with soy caused a social media outrage? The company now specifically messages that its patties are 100% beef, with no fillers, as proof of quality.

    The same goes for plant-based consumers. When they choose to have a plant-based product, they are doing so consciously, and for a variety of reasons such as health, ethics, or the environment. None of these reasons is strengthened by adding animal protein to the mix. So, the blend likely dilutes the value proposition for both camps.

    Choice and Control: The Art of Personalization

    Most consumers enjoy a mix of plant-based and animal-based foods, but they do so on their own terms. They might choose a purely plant-based dish one day and mix and match both plant and animal foods another day. Some are vegan at home, whilst indulging in a pepperoni pizza on weekends, or they might stretch ground beef with veggies and bread crumbs for cost savings. The key is personalization and control over the mixing and matching based on specific occasions and recipes. It is unlikely for a single product to satisfy such divergent needs, especially if it’s a standard product like a burger patty.

    Narrow Appeal: The Challenge of a Niche Market

    Given these factors, blended meat risks becoming a niche product category. For meat eaters, adding plant-based elements may seem like a compromise in quality and taste. For plant-based consumers, the introduction of animal ingredients feels counterintuitive. The appeal might be limited to a small segment of flexitarians, driven by a specific need or usage occasion, likely making it a commercial challenge. 

    Blending to meet a specific consumer need, such as lower cost or better nutrition, could be a viable idea, but it’s just not a BIG idea. 

    So, What’s the Way Forward?

    To give blended meat the best chance of success, we need a consumer-centric approach. Here are two potential positioning strategies:

    1. Lead with Flavor: People enjoy exploring new flavors. Incorporating caramelized onions and roasted bell peppers on a burger, or adding a portobello mushroom for an umami boost, can enhance the appeal. This approach focuses on exciting flavors rather than compromising taste or nutritional values. Blending animal-based meat with whole plant ingredients that contribute to an intriguing flavor profile has potential, especially if brands lead with a positive taste experience. However, this might result in occasional purchases due to fractionated usage occasions, leading to low turnover.
    2. Better Nutrition without Compromise: Many consumers aspire to eat healthier foods. Blended meat products offering additional nutritional benefits, such as more fiber, reduced saturated fat, and fewer calories, could be appealing. However, ensuring that taste is not compromised is crucial. Since most consumers choose animal-based meat for its taste, any compromise on this front could spell trouble. Thus, a strategy that leads with great taste, while delivering improved nutrition as a secondary benefit, might hold more promise.

    Solving The Blended Meat Puzzle

    Successfully positioning blended meat products requires navigating the complex landscape of consumer preferences, quality perceptions, cultural influences, and dietary choices. While the idea holds potential, its success hinges on more than just merging two types of proteins, as a logical response to current struggles of plant-based meat. It demands a deep understanding of consumer desires and their choices in integrating plant-based and animal-based foods into their diets. Only by tapping into these nuances can blended meat transcend being a fleeting trend and secure a meaningful place in our diverse and dynamic food landscape.

    The post Why Blended Meat is Not a BIG Idea appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • belgium plant based
    6 Mins Read

    Belgium is halting the establishment of guidelines against plant-based meat labelling after continued disagreement among stakeholders, but its higher VAT on milk alternatives is hurting the sector, especially one homegrown brand.

    The plant-based labelling war in Belgium is – for now – over, with ‘vegetarian steaks’ and ‘vegan burgers’ all fair game after the country’s lawmakers failed to reach a consensus on the subject.

    Following political discussions dating back to 2022, economy minister Pierre-Yves Dermagne has announced that the government has halted its process of establishing guidelines on the labelling of meatless food products, owing to widespread disagreement on the topic.

    But while that may be good news, Belgium’s stance on plant-based milk taxes is worrying, and – in the case of the company – potentially fatal.

    Why Belgium has paused its plant-based meat labelling guidance

    belgium plant based meat
    Courtesy: Getty Images/Groen Limburg

    In 2020, the EU decided to vote against a proposed labelling ban for plant-based meat products, which led to a working group comprising Boerenbond, the National Union of Butchers, Bacon Butchers and Caterers, the General Farmers’ Syndicate, the Federation of Meat Producers, ProVeg International, and others, which sought to develop “clear guidelines” for plant-based labels. The group used the common argument of consumer confusion, arguing that companies can’t use meat-related terms for alternative products.

    It sparked discussions that have lasted years, as well as backlash from plant-based advocacy groups the Good Food Institute Europe, the European Vegetarian Union, and ProVeg. They have urged the Belgian government to reject these guidelines, claiming that they disrespect consumers and endanger market unity in the EU.

    “We feared that very restrictive guidelines regarding permitted vegetarian names would seriously compromise the accessibility and promotion of vegetarian food – which we really need to work on in the context of the fight against global warming,” said Green MP Barbara Creemers. Touching upon the consumer confusion aspect, she added: “What is the worst that can happen? That you come home with a bowl of vegetarian chicken cubes when you thought it contained real chicken?”

    Creemers was told by Dermagne – who, alongside agriculture minister David Clarinval and state secretary for consumer protection Alexia Bertrand, was responsible for this issue – that there would be no new Belgian guidelines on plant-based meat labels. “There is still great dissonance between the various stakeholders regarding the guide with guidelines that has been drawn up,” Dermagne said, according to Nieuwsblad.

    The guidelines that were drawn up were actually discussed at the cabinet level too. “But there is no political consensus on its publication, which I think is a shame,” the economy minister added.

    “Whilst the process for developing the guideline has not officially changed, we believe it is unlikely to get any further before the next election [in June],” said ProVeg Belgium communications manager Fien Louwagie. “We hope that, post-election, the new Government acknowledges that consumers are simply not confused by plant-based foods carrying ‘meaty’ names and abandons the development of the guidelines altogether.”

    Other European countries have been successful in efforts to ban the use of meat-related terms on plant-based products, most recently France and Italy. Similar discourse is ongoing in Poland. Meanwhile, Switzerland ruled against such a legislation, with a court announcing that such labels aren’t deceptive to consumers.

    Discriminatory taxes leave local alt-milk brand reeling

    tiptoh
    Courtesy: Tiptoh

    While the halting of the process is a positive sign for plant-based advocates, Belgium’s “fiscal discrimination” against plant-based milk is a major hurdle. Currently, most drinks are subject to excise duties and packaging taxes, which amount to 22 cents for sweetened and 17 cents for unsweetened beverages. Three products are exempt from these, though: cow’s milk, soy milk and rice milk.

    However, some companies aiming to come up with even more climate-friendly alternatives to rice or soy (such as pea or oat) are finding it difficult to understand why they’re treated any differently. One of them is pea milk maker Top Toh, which last year faced a bill of €30,000 in overdue excise duties, followed by a fine of €10,000.

    “I had no idea we had to pay excise taxes,” Tip Toh founder Arnaud Muylaert told De Tijd. “That invoice was a very unpleasant surprise. €40,000 is a lot for a company with a turnover of €200,000.” He added: “Why does the government impose excise duties on other plant-based drinks such as oat, almond and pea milk? Especially since [they focus] on sustainability?”

    The unexpected bill has forced Tip Toh to raise its prices, with its products now costing €3, which puts it at a major disadvantage, considering soy and dairy cost about €1.20 for the same amount, while most alt-milks are priced below €3. While finance minister Vincent Van Pethegem has confirmed he’s reviewing the exemption for milk, any change isn’t imminent as it would need a change in law, and will be a task for the next government.

    That has left Muylaert and Tip Toh in a state of bother. “I am concerned about the survival of our company,” she said. “We can pay the excise duties, taxes and fines thanks to recently obtained subordinated loans of €180,000. But I would rather use that money for innovation and growth. We wanted to hire our first employee, but we had to cancel those plans.”

    The entrepreneur has been in touch with the cabinets of lawmakers and spoke to Sammy Mahdi, president of the CD&V party. “They told me they support me, but still nothing happens. I never expected that the government would oppose our project,” he said.

    It’s not just small startups that are calling for a change. Danone, parent company of Alpro, Europe’s leading plant-based dairy producer, is also in the same boat. “There needs to be harmonization,” said Danone communications and sustainability director Nathalie Guillaume. “Our society is undergoing a sustainability transition. A flexitarian diet of dairy and plant-based alternatives is the future. The price must be accessible. Therefore, there should be no discrimination in the valuation of both types of milk drinks.”

    plant based milk tax
    Courtesy: GFI Europe

    Belgium isn’t the only country with disproportionate taxes on plant-based dairy. In Germany, vegan alternatives are charged 19%, versus 7% for dairy (though there are calls for parity), Hungary has a 22% levy on plant-based and 5% tax on conventional dairy, while Italy similarly imposed 22% and 4%, respectively. The Netherlands, meanwhile, is going backwards: it previously carried an identical VAT rate of 9%, but new rules mean a 196% increase in alt-milk taxes (except soy).

    But Belgium can follow the lead of the Czech Republic, which closed the gap between the tax laid on cow’s milk and plant-based alternatives – both now carry a 10% levy. Greece has also reduced its plant-based milk VAT from 24% to parity with cow’s milk (13%) now. There’s a lot resting on Belgium’s upcoming elections.

    The post Plant-Based Meat Labelling Faces Respite in Belgium, But Alt-Milk Taxes Hurt Local Brand appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • v2food soulara
    6 Mins Read

    Leading Australian plant-based meat maker v2food has acquired ready meal brands Soulara and MACROS for an undisclosed sum to expand its portfolio, in a sector flooding with M&A activity.

    Aussie alt-meat leader v2food has expanded its portfolio with the acquisition of local ready-meal brands Soulara and MACROS, which will help broaden its distribution reach beyond in-person channels via its proprietary D2C e-commerce platform.

    Founded in 2019, v2food makes meat analogues like burgers, mince, sausages and schnitzels using soy protein. Now, though, it is diversifying into whole-food plant-based options with the acquisition of Soulara, which offers an extensive range of nearly 40 ready meals. This is an extension to v2food’s own ready-to-eat line, launched in 2022, helping cater to a broader audience and evolving preferences.

    “We know consumers have diverse needs when it comes to adopting a plant-based diet,” said Sean Bone, commercial manager at Soulara. “Soulara has carved a niche for itself with its focus on delivering meals designed by our team of chefs and dieticians to ensure best-in-class taste, nutrition and value.”

    v2food
    Courtesy: v2food

    The deal will see Soulara and MACROS be combined under a new entity called Flexitarian Meal Solutions, selling between 50,000 and 100,000 meals per week, a v2food spokesperson confirmed. While they declined to comment on the financial or restructuring aspects of the deal, they acknowledged that while MACROS isn’t a plant-based business, v2food is “excited to explore how to incorporate more plant-based protein solutions in the range to appeal to the growing number of flexitarians in Australia”.

    Catering to Australia’s diverse flexitarian and vegan consumers

    Founded in 2017 as Freshara, Soulara claims to be Australia’s first plant-based ready meal subscription, with its broad lineup catering to specific consumer needs like high-protein dishes and calorie-controlled meals, alongside both veggie-forward and seitan-centric options. Some of the highlights include a Supercharged Satay, Spaghetti Veganese, African Peanut Stew, and Balinese Mie Goreng.

    “We are excited to unite Australia’s number one plant-based ingredients company with Australia’s number one plant-based ready-made meals brand,” said v2food CEO Tim York. “We know consumers want to eat more plant-based products in their diets, but some of the barriers to making this change are concerns around taste and how to cook them – by adding Soulara to our portfolio, we can further demonstrate how easy and delicious meat reduction can be.”

    vegan brand acquisitions
    Courtesy: v2food

    This is a pertinent point when you look at v2food’s latest launch. At SXSW Sydney in October, it unveiled RepliHue, a new colour system for plant-based meat. The company argues that most plant proteins remain the same shade before and after cooking, but through its tech, these can shift hues from raw-looking to brown-grey at the same time and temperature as their conventional counterparts do.

    This creates a ‘bleeding’ effect, the same aspect Impossible Foods banks on with its genetically modified soy-derived heme ingredient. RepliHue is derived naturally from red algae and other plants, and has the ability to consume carbon dioxide and use light for energy. v2food argues that its innovation also improves the taste and texture of alt-meat, which is a crucial consideration for Australians – a 1,039-person YouGov poll from October revealed that taste is the number-one factor influencing food choices for meat-eaters, flexitarians, vegans, vegetarians and pescetarians alike.

    "v2food's expertise in plant protein is the ideal complement to Soulara’s vegetable-forward approach, as we strive together to provide a well-rounded menu for consumers seeking a plant-based lifestyle," said Bone. While the jury's out on whether Australians are looking to go vegan, they certainly are eating less meat (though still a very high amount).

    Last year, a 3,016-person study by Queensland’s Griffith University found that nearly a third (32.2%) of Australians had reduced their meat consumption over the previous 12 months. Crucially, 71.3% said they either eat completely meatless diets, mostly vegan or have some plant-based dishes in an overall omnivorous diet – and 45.6% reported eating plant-based meat sometimes.

    Vegan acquisitions ramp up as industry looks to consolidate

    "As the plant-based movement continues to gain momentum, v2food is excited about the endless possibilities this acquisition brings for the brand, its consumers, and the wider community," stated York.

    It speaks to the increased amount of M&A activity and consolidation in the vegan industry recently. In as recently as October, for example, All G Foods spun off its alt-meat brand Love Buds, which merged with Fenn Foods’ vEEF to form The Aussie Plant-Based Co. But this isn't a trend limited to Australia, which (alongside New Zealand) had the highest alt-protein investments in Q1 2023.

    aussie plant based co
    Courtesy: Love Buds

    In October, Finnish alt-dairy brand Oddlygood acquired Nordic brand Planti, making it the market leader in vegan “spoonable snacks” in Sweden and cooking products in Finland. The same month saw US company Superlatus enter an agreement to buy plant-based dairy and egg company Spero, months after it agreed to purchase precision fermentation dairy leader Perfect Day's consumer brands under The Urgent Company umbrella. Also in October, German food conglomerate Pfeifer & Langen earned a majority stake in sausage-maker-turned-alt-meat brand Rügenwalder Mühle.

    A month later, British artisanal vegan cheese maker Palace Culture was taken over by The Compleat Food Group (formerly Winterbotham Darby), which owns fellow plant-based brands Squeaky Bean and Vadasz, while Canada’s Protein Powered Farms bought Lovingly Made Ingredients, the plant protein extrusion facility built and previously owned by Meatless Farm.

    vegan food group
    Courtesy: The Vegan Food Group

    In December, Indian superfood brand Nourish You acquired alt-dairy startup One Good, in one of the country's largest plant-based M&A deals. And just earlier this month, vegan burger chain Next Level Burger purchased restaurant group Veggie Grill (alongside its Más Veggies taco chain) to expand its footprint to 27 locations. This came at the same time the UK's VFC turned into a holding company called the Vegan Food Group to step up its acquisitions, on the back of its purchase of Meatless Farm and Clive's Purely Plants last year.

    The flurry of activity is explained by the industry outlook of Andy Shovel, co-founder of UK plant-based meat brand THIS. "We’re now at a stage where the sector is consolidating and poor-quality brands are coming out the market, with more brands consumers can trust and shelves that are way easier to navigate," he told Green Queen in October.

    v2food an outlier in the global plant-based sector

    plant based acquistions
    Courtesy: v2food

    v2food's strategy mirrors that of the Vegan Food Group, according to Simon Eassom, executive director of Aussie alt-protein non-profit Food Frontier. The company is already the most-funded business in the plant-based Industry down under, having raised AU$185M ($138M) following Series B and B+ rounds in 2020 and 2021, respectively. It also has a multinational deal with Burger King, which uses its beef in the Rebel Whopper in the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Thailand and, of course, Australia (under the Burger King franchise Hungry Jack's).

    “Its acquisition of direct-to-consumer brand Soulara adds another channel in its go-to-market strategy," said Eassom. "We wouldn’t be surprised if there are further announcements from them in the ready meal space, and their push into the service sector with pies and other utility products ensures that v2food is consolidating its position as a major food producer."

    He added: “v2food is doing something that few, if any, other major plant-based companies are doing anywhere around the world: branching into all channels with offerings to suit and doing it via mergers and acquisitions."

    The post Aussie Vegan Meat Maker v2food Acquires Ready Meal Brands as Plant Based Sector Undergoes Consolidation appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • aleph farms regulatory approval
    9 Mins Read

    Israeli-cultivated meat producer Aleph Farms has received the world’s first regulatory approval for cell-cultured beef, marking a milestone in the alternative protein sector.

    This makes Israel – still in the middle of regional conflict – only the third country to greenlight cultivated meat, paving the way for Aleph Farms to introduce its Black Angus Petit Steak to diners soon.

    Israel’s Aleph Farms has become the first company in the world to earn regulatory approval for cultivated beef, after the Israeli Ministry of Health (IMOH) issued a ‘no questions’ letter for its consumer brand Aleph Cuts in December – akin to an FDA ‘No Questions’ letter in the US. It allows the producer to market its products – currently priced similarly to premium conventional beef – in the country, with plans to roll out at restaurants and, eventually, retailers.

    With the greenlight, Israel joins a very short list of countries to allow the sale of cultured meat – only Singapore (Eat Just in 2020) and the US (Upside Foods and Eat Just in 2023) have done so. But these approvals were all done for cell-based chicken products, meaning Aleph Farms is the first company permitted to sell cultivated beef.

    “This announcement marks a critical leap in the global race to make the meat that people love, that’s also better for our climate, biodiversity, and food security,” said Bruce Friedrich, founder and president of alternative protein think tank the Good Food Institute (GFI). “We’re thrilled consumers in Israel will soon join those in the US and Singapore as being among the first to be able to purchase these delicious products.”

    Aleph Farms’ cultured meat costs the same as premium beef

    lab grown meat approval
    Courtesy: Aleph Farms

    The decision brings an end to a process a year-and-a-half in the making, when Aleph Farms filed its initial submission to the health ministry, following a pre-submission consultation. The company worked closely with the Food Risk Management Department, led by co-founder Dr Ziva Hamama, to ensure “full compliance with safety standards” for these novel proteins.

    “This regulatory approval grants us permission to produce and market our product in Israel, subject to specific directions for labelling and marketing provided by the Israeli Ministry of Health, and the completion of Good Manufacturing Practices inspection for our pilot production facility,” explained Yifat Gavriel, the company’s regulatory affairs chief.

    The first product to be unveiled is Aleph Farms’ cultivated thin-cut Petit Steak, which was first introduced in April with the Aleph Cuts brand. The hybrid meat product comprises non-modified, non-immortalised cells of a premium Black Angus cow named Lucy, alongside a plant protein matrix made of soy and wheat. Apart from the starter cells derived from one of the cow’s fertilised eggs, there are no other animal-sourced components (such as fetal bovine serum, or FBS) in the cultivation process or final product.

    The controlled and traceable process is carried out in an aseptic production environment, which – the company states – increases transparency and significantly reduces contamination risks. Plus, there’s no presence of antibiotics in the process.

    Once the requirements mentioned above (labelling and mark-of-facility inspection) are fulfilled, we will introduce Aleph Cuts to diners, offering exclusive tasting experiences curated in collaboration with select partners. “At first, the product will be available in select restaurants,” Yoav Reisler, senior marketing and communications manager at Aleph Farms, told Green Queen. “Afterwards, it will become available at foodservice and retail locations.”

    On the cost question, he revealed: “At the time of our soft launch, Aleph Cuts will be priced similarly to premium conventional beef. We are taking various steps to drive economies of scale and achieve price parity with more of the conventional beef market within a few years from launch.”

    No doubt, making it a hybrid product helps too, as this is the path some envision cultivated meat to enter the market (Dutch producer Meatable is taking this approach too). “Hybrid products will allow the cultivated market the chance to build and become normalised with consumers, while also – importantly – generating the revenues and business necessary to keep dollars flowing into the space, so scale can be further achieved,” one alt-protein investor told Green Queen in December.

    Cultured meat needs to reach production costs of $2.92 per pound to be price-competitive with conventional meat. But while companies have managed to cut manufacturing costs by 99% in less than a decadeMcKinsey analysis estimates that it will still take until 2030 for these proteins to reach parity. “Of common animal proteins, beef delivers the highest value in global markets, so by focusing on cultivated beef, we are able to shorten the timeline to price parity,” explained Reisler

    Israel’s need – and support – for cultivated meat

    cultured meat regulatory approval
    Courtesy: Aleph Farms

    “The entire Aleph team has united in strength and determination to deliver no matter what during these difficult times in Israel. We are excited to carry this resilience forward in the form of innovation in agriculture and food security,” said Aleph Farms co-founder and CEO Didier Toubia.

    It’s a milestone for a country that has long been supportive of alternative proteins – and for good measure, given the nation’s battle with food insecurity: government figures show that 16% of Israeli families and 21% of children did not have adequate access to safe, nutritious food in 2021. Among families with children, 19% experienced food insecurity, and 8.5% suffered from severe insecurity.

    As cultivated meat doesn’t rely on livestock agriculture, huge swathes of farmland, or vast amounts of water, the benefits are as important for climate change as they are for food security. This is especially true for beef, which emits more greenhouse gas emissions than any other foodstuff. It’s a meat loved by Israelis, who eat 19.6kg of it per year and are expected to consume over 29kg annually by 2029.

    But uniquely, Israel is known to be one of the most vegan-friendly countries in the world. According to a 2017 survey (the latest data available), 5% of its citizens identify as vegans and 8% as vegetarians. At the same time, 23% expressed a desire to cut their intake of meat.

    This explains Israel’s support for alternative proteins, which “stands out globally”, according to Alla Voldman, VP of strategy and policy at GFI Israel. “Three out of the first eight cultivated meat companies worldwide are Israeli. 15% of global investments in the field are allocated to Israeli-cultivated meat companies,” she noted.

    This ecosystem includes the world’s largest cultivated meat consortium, which Aleph Farms is a part of. A three-year project to scale up production and drive down costs of cultivated meat, it received funding to the tune of 66 million NIS ($18M).

    “We believe that the robust presence of cultivated meat companies, fermentation, and plant-based, coupled with advanced academic research, entrepreneurship, industry, and unique consumer market, provide Israel with an opportunity to lead the field forward,” Voldman added. “This strengthens our ability to provide value to countries worldwide in an era of climate and food security crises.”

    Toubia added: “We believe that addressing joint challenges like food security is the best way to ensure the prosperity of the Middle East and other parts of the world that rely heavily on massive food imports, especially in Asia.”

    But the incidence of veganism be a catalyst for the success of a fellow alt-protein pillar in cultivated meat? “I’m not sure it’s one of the most significant markers,” Reisler said. “Aleph Cuts are animal-based products, as the original source of animal cells is a cow. However, many vegetarians and vegans may call Aleph Cuts vegetarian-friendly and vegan-friendly, as the product is not harvested from an animal carcass and there is no slaughter involved in the production.” [As noted above, the starter cells for Aleph Farm’s beef steaks are sourced from the fertilised eggs of a cow, and as such, cultivated meat isn’t usually regarded as vegan-friendly – for an ethical take, this is a good read.]

    What’s next for Aleph Farms after regulatory approval?

    cultured meat israel
    Courtesy: Aleph Farms

    Aleph Farms’ regulatory approval in Israel is a huge win – but it isn’t stopping there. The company has filed for clearance in Singapore, Switzerland, the UK and the US, and is advancing its applications in other markets too. “Entrance to Asia (via Singapore) and the Middle East (via Israel) is currently our main focus. We expect to receive positive indications from the Singapore Food Agency soon,” confirmed Reisler.

    Pressed on the progress with these applications – particularly in the UK, as there is talk about a bilateral deal to fast-track approval for Aleph Farms – he told Green Queen: “We maintain a dynamic, ongoing channel of communication with those regulatory agencies as part of our review process. They have been receptive in regard to our production and process development, and have shown appreciation for our methodological science-based approach to ensuring the safety of our process and product.”

    The company is simultaneously pursuing a kosher certificate for its facility from local rabbinate authorities too. This is key for a company based in Israel and catering to a large Jewish population, which eats kosher food as directed by the Torah. There are encouraging signs for Aleph Farms here, with Israel’s chief rabbi David Lau declaring last January that its non-FBS steak could be considered kosher and akin to eating a vegetable (parve).

    As it awaits decisions from other regulators globally, its approval in Israel could be a precursor for things to come. “2024 stands to be a landmark year for the advancement of regulatory pathways and commercialisation of cultivated meat,” claimed Gavriel.

    Meatable is expecting a green light for its cultivated pork from Singapore this year, and France’s Vital Meat claims it’s the frontrunner to be the first European startup to be approved in the city-state. Meanwhile, Australia’s Vow Food is in the middle of a consultation process after its cultured quail was cleared as safe to eat by the bilateral Food Standards Australia New Zealand in December.

    “There’s still work ahead of us to continue to scale up, meet consumer expectations and move toward the mainstream. However, I think on the technology side, the scientific side, in terms of process development, early industrialisation and regulatory compliance, we have made a huge leapfrog, and I’m quite happy to see that,” Toubia told Green Queen founding editor Sonalie Figueiras on the Green Queen in Conversation: Cultivated Meat Pioneers podcast in September. “The industry is really on the verge of going to market and starting initial acceptance.”

    Following a $105 Series B round in 2021, Aleph Farms has raised a total of $118M in funding – Toubia has outlined the company’s aim to reach $1B in revenue by 2030. This will be helped by its manufacturing advancements over the last couple of years. In February 2022, it moved to a 65,000 sq ft plant in Rehovot, Israel, which increased its capacity by six times to be able to initially produce 10 tonnes of cultivated steak annually. Last year, it announced the acquisition of another manufacturing facility in Modi’in, Israel, alongside a new manufacturing agreement with ESCO Aster in Singapore (the world’s only approved industrial manufacturer for cultured meat).

    “With its global leadership in cellular agriculture, Israel continues to push for greater regional integration and economic collaboration, which will be crucial for stabilising the region,” said Toubia. “We believe that addressing joint challenges like food security is the best way to ensure the prosperity of the Middle East and other parts of the world that rely heavily on massive food imports, especially in Asia.

    “Now more than ever, Aleph Farms remains committed to making the world a better place.”

    The post Aleph Farms: Israel Awards the World’s First Regulatory Approval for Cultivated Beef appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • beyond meat ad
    6 Mins Read

    In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Ben & Jerry’s new oat milk ice-creams, Beyond Meat’s new marketing campaigns, and a study linking plant-based diets to a lower Covid-19 risk.

    New products and launches

    Ice-cream giant Ben & Jerry’s has released its first new flavour after reformulating its non-dairy offerings with oat milk. A vegan version of a fan favourite, the Strawberry Cheezecake is available at retailers and for delivery in the US.

    ben and jerry's non dairy
    Courtesy: Ben & Jerry’s

    And in the UK, Ben & Jerry’s has teamed up with vegan frozen food startup One Planet Pizza to offer a meal deal at Asda for Veganuary. It means the former’s new Oat of this Swirled sundae and latter’s Peppernomi Pizza are available for £5, saving you £4.50.

    At Morrisons, Mars has released a vegan version of its Galaxy Fruit & Nut chocolate bar, which is available as a 100g bar or in a 40g snacking format, which will be in stores nationwide from January 22.

    Another sweet treat comes courtesy of Premier Foods, which has launched vegan versions of its famous McDougalls jelly for foodservice clients in three flavours: strawberry, raspberry, and orange. The company uses carrageenan to replace gelatin.

    UK foodservice wholesaler Brakes has rolled out a new vegan range called Sysco Simply Plant Based, which currently features five centrepiece dishes like Chestnut & Seed Roast. The lineup will expand to reach over 50 products in the next 18 months.

    Speaking of foodservice, British noodle chain Chopstix – which specialises in Chinese takeouts – has launched a plant-based Teriyaki Beef dish (created by Miami Foods) for Veganuary. Titled All Leaf, No Beef Teriyaki, it is available across its stores nationwide.

    flora butter
    Courtesy: Upfield

    Over to some dairy news: European dairy giant Upfield has launched what it claims is the world’s first plastic-free, recyclable tub for its Flora plant butters and spreads, in collaboration with Footprint, MCC and Pagès Group. It is part of the company’s mission to reduce plastic content by 80% by 2030.

    Meanwhile, Dutch alt-dairy startup Willicroft is debuting its new precise-fermented vegan butter, named Original Better, at Crisp stores across the Netherlands.

    Across the Atlantic, Bel Group-owned The Laughing Cow has launched a dairy-free version of its spreadable Garlic & Herb wedges at Whole Foods in the US, available for $4.49. It is now exploring spicy flavours for its vegan range.

    South Korean dairy-free brand Armored Fresh has unveiled a new innovation with its oat milk cheese in the US: Pepper Jack slices. The startup’s products are available at Kroger, Fresh Thyme Market, Town and Country Foods, and Fred Meyer, alongside foodservice clients.

    oat milk cheese
    Courtesy: Armored Fresh

    Also in the US, Colorado-based mycelium meat producer Meati has expanded into Super Target stores, and has signed an agreement for a listing at Albertsons too, as the company moves to reach 8,000 retail locations by the summer.

    And Canada’s Modern Plant-Based Foods has introduced a seaweed-based Vegan Kaviar line in Salmon, Wasabi, and Beluga flavours, initially targeting sushi and seafood restaurants.

    Finance and research news

    In a sad development, New Zealand-based vegan meal service The Kai Box is shutting down after eight years, the founders announced on Facebook.

    But in more positive news, Better Foods, the plant-based subsidiary of South Korea’s Shinsegae Food, has attracted investment from Cleveland Avenue, a VC fund founded by former McDonald’s CEO Don Thompson. The company will produce alt-dairy products alongside its current meat portfolio to facilitate its entry into the US market.

    Seattle-based Rebellyous Foods has announced that it nearly doubled its sales in 2023, and is now donating its plant-based chicken to universities participating in the Humane Society of the United States’ Forward Food Veganuary programme, which trains chefs on vegan prep.

    future food quick bites
    Courtesy: Rebellyous Foods

    In France, food procession giant Tereos is investing €4M in its plant protein brand Ensemble to triple the production of its Marckolsheim Alsace plant this year, following a 50% growth in sales in 2023.

    UK biotech farm FaBao, which identifies superior microbial bioproducts that can improve soil health, boost crop production and protect ecosystems, has secured a £5.3M investment from VC funds Clean Growth Fund, Pymwymic, and Ship2B Ventures.

    Enifer, a Finnish biotech mycoprotein startup, has secured a €12M grant from the European Union NextGenerationEU recovery instrument to fund the construction of a commercial-scale manufacturing facility for its Pekilo protein.

    At alt-meat giant Beyond Meat, CFO Lubi Kutua is taking over as interim chief accounting officer from Henry Dieu, who has left the company for another opportunity.

    helaina
    Courtesy: Helaina

    New York-based precision fermentation company Helaina, which is making recombinant human lactoferrin derived from fungi, has released a paper detailing the structure of its first protein, Effera.

    A widely shared study published earlier this month has revealed that people following vegan and vegetarian diets have a 39% lower risk of developing Covid-19, and are less likely to experience severe symptoms than omnivores.

    Meanwhile, in the Netherlands, Unilever, IFF and Wageningen University are undertaking a four-year reserach project to explore how flavours bind to protein molecules and recommend novel strategies to elevate the sensory experience of plant-based meats.

    Policy, marketing and awards

    French cultivated chicken producer Vital Meat claims it is a frontrunner to be the first European cultured meat startup to receive regulatory approval in Singapore, having filed for clearance in December.

    Speaking of cultured meat regulation, Japan’s framework is about to get more complicated, with the Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare transferring its food hygiene standards division to the Consumer Affairs Agency (while continuing to oversee food safety), which means companies must liaise with two agencies starting in April.

    It’s a big week for Beyond Meat, which has launched two new ad campaigns. In the US, its Literally the Least You Can Do spot playfully mocks people’s non-adherence to New Year’s resolutions, featuring returning star Rizwan Manji promoting its heart-healthy steak. And in the UK, its Taste You Can Believe In pokes fun at classic Veganuary misconceptions and spotlights taste – a factor key for Britain’s alt-meat-eaters.

    German cocoa-free chocolate producer ChoViva has been nominated for a Consumer Award by ISM Cologne and Foodnewsgermany for its Neapolitaner Waffeln collaboration with Rewe Group‘s own-label brand, ja!

    The Vegan Women Summit has announced 24 finalists in eight categories for the inaugural VWS Awards, which include BioCraft Pet Nutrition, Viva!, Sprout Organic, VBites founder Heather Mills and Polish MEP Sylwia Spurek. The winners will be announced on May 10.

    Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

    The post Future Food Quick Bites: Ben & Berry’s, Better Butter & A Covid-19 Study appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • sodexo plant based
    5 Mins Read

    French catering group Sodexo has revealed that 11% of all its meals sold at UK and Ireland sites in 2023 were vegan or vegetarian, a marginal increase from the previous year. It has also made strides in promoting food security, and is ahead of schedule on its net-zero plan.

    Japanese Teriyaki Tofu, Southern Indian Chickpea Curry, and Potato and Cauliflower Masala are some of the dishes that have helped Sodexo witness a year-on-year increase in plant-based consumption. From January to November last year, an analysis of over 2.7 million meals across 285 of its UK and Ireland client sites found that 11% were vegan or vegetarian.

    This marks an incremental improvement on last year’s share of 10%, and aligns with the company’s social impact pledge and commitment to increase the intake of sustainable meals. The caterer has previously laid out its plans to make 33% of its menus plant-based by 2025, as part of its wider net-zero target for 2040, which it now says is ahead of schedule.

    Sodexo makes strides with plant-based meals and net-zero goals

    vegan catering
    Courtesy: Sodexo

    Sodexo research reveals that – like last year – the highest amount of vegan meal consumption occurred in the East Midlands, though its share dropped from 21% to 19%. People chose meat-free dishes 18% of the time in the North West (versus 15% in 2022), 16% in Ireland (versus 8%), 15% in London (versus 11%), 13% in Wales (versus 15%) and 11% in Scotland (versus 10%).

    “The increasing preference for meat-free options among our customers is a testament to both the shift in consumer awareness and to the work done by our talented chefs to reformulate menus and create new delicious plant-forward and plant-based recipes,” said Claire Atkins Morris, sustainability director at Sodexo UK and Ireland. “With a wide array of tasty and nutritious options available across our client sites, it is important that our consumers are able to make well-informed decisions about the food they eat.”

    The news comes a week after Sodexo announced that it had reduced 37% of its scope 3 emissions (from a 2017 baseline), representing the removal of almost 400,000 tonnes of CO2e by May 31, 2023. That has put the catering company ahead of schedule en route to its 2040 decarbonisation goal – it would have needed to slash emissions by 25.5% by the end of fiscal year 2023 to stay on course, but a faster reduction has meant its footprint is now at 689,172 tonnes of CO2e.

    Now, Sodexo has set science-based forest, land and agriculture (FLAG) targets – a 40% absolute GHG emissions reduction by 2030 and a 72% cut by 2040. “Working towards net zero is complex and can be an overwhelming challenge. With multiple data sets and action levers across business activities, it isn’t easy,” said Atkins Morris.

    “There are many opportunities for learning, refining and improving as we go. This, naturally, means that we need to be agile to the fast pace of change informed by external factors. This year, for example, we chose to move away from our 2025 carbon-neutral target and reallocate funds to decarbonisation projects. We should all expect to see and be comfortable with changes in our journey, rebaselining and the influences of the external landscape.”

    Sodexo was also the subject of a study by Profundo, commissioned by Madre Brava, which looked at the impact of the caterer and five supermarkets switching to 50% plant-based proteins by 2030. It revealed that this would reduce GHG emissions by 31.6 million tonnes per year, which is equivalent to removing over 25 million cars from EU roads. Plus, it would free up 102,000 sq km of land (about the size of Hungary) and save 670 million cubic metres of water (around 268,000 Olympic-size swimming pools) a year.

    Global initiatives for sustainable catering

    3d printed burger
    Courtesy: SavorEat

    Sodexo’s continued plant-based growth comes at a time when many universities are increasingly adopting plant-based food. Within the UK, the Universities of Stirling, Birmingham, Queen Mary, London Metropolitan, Kent, University College London and Cambridge have already voted to introduce fully plant-based menus at their eateries. In fact, over 650 academics and campaigners have written an open letter to British universities to switch to 100% vegan catering.

    But it’s not just the UK that is seeing such advancements in foodservice. In 2021, Sodexo Canada announced it would switch 20% of its protein purchases to plant-based over the next few years, while it aims to turn 42% of its college and university menus vegan in the US, where it also partnered with Israeli food tech startup SavorEat to launch the first 3D-printing robot for plant-based burgers at the University of Denver.

    The caterer has previously had a successful corporate pilot with LinkedIn too, where its subsidiary the Good Eating Company and behavioural choice agency Greener By Default combined to halve the carbon emissions of the social media company’s San Francisco office. The 12-week pilot saved 14,400 of CO2e by making two-thirds of the menu vegan, including opting for oat milk as the default coffee bar choice and flavour descriptors over words like “vegan” and “vegetarian” on menu cards.

    The results of the research come during Veganuary, which is set to break its partnership record yet again this year. “We are delighted to see an upward trend in Sodexo’s meat-free meal sales again,” said the campaign’s communications head, Toni Vernelli. “Offering tasty and accessible options is crucial in encouraging more individuals to consider plant-based choices.”

    This is a trend reflected in the wider catering industry too. Compass Group, the world’s largest catering company, has set the goal of replacing 40% of its animal proteins with plant-based by the end of the decade. Its subsidies Chartwells Higher Education, meanwhile, revealed in November that there has been an increase in students looking for climate-friendly meals in US universities and colleges since the introduction of carbon labels on its menus.

    Outside its own menus, Sodexo’s plant-based commitments have extended to its Stop Hunger Foundation, which in 2021 partnered with UK charity Made In Hackney to support its mission to provide free, nutritious vegan meals to over 300 people weekly. “The Stop Hunger Foundation has provided critical support to our community meal service and cookery classes helping us tackle food insecurity for hundreds of households with nutritious, diverse, planet-friendly meals,” said Made In Hackney founder Sarah Bentley.

    “Evolving the nation’s eating habits to more plant-centred eating is a crucial tool in the fight against the climate crisis and spiralling lifestyle-related health diseases. It is inspiring to work with the Stop Hunger Foundation and Sodexo as they see the interconnectedness of all these issues and how plant-based food can play a central role in tackling them all.”

    The post Sodexo: Ahead of Schedule on Net Zero Plan as 11% of All UK/Ireland Meals Sold Are Meatless appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • vegan switzerland
    6 Mins Read

    A new survey by Coop Switzerland has revealed that over half of Swiss consumers have eaten plant-based alternatives to meat, dairy and seafood – a demographic it labels ‘substitarians’ – while nearly six in 10 are reducing their consumption of animal-source foods, making it a country centred around flexitarians.

    Swiss retail and wholesale giant Coop Switzerland has unveiled a 2,221-person survey exploring the consumption habits of the country’s population, which found that meat consumption has declined, while a subcategory of consumers called ‘substitarians’ – or those who eat plant-based meat products – has emerged.

    Coop’s Plant Based Food Report suggests that 58% of people are consciously avoiding animal-derived foods like meat, dairy and eggs several times a month, which makes them fit into the flexitarian category (comprising 61% of women and 56% of men). And while a high number of consumers still consume these products at least several times a week – 65% eat cheese, 62% meat and 55% milk – the year-on-year intake is still down by two, three and three percentage points, respectively.

    Who are Switzerland’s substitarians?

    coop switzerland
    Courtesy: Coop Switzerland

    Over a quarter of respondents (28%) eat plant-based meat, seafood and dairy several times a month, while another 28% do so on occasion, making 56% of the Swiss population substitarians. In fact, 51% have been consuming vegan analogues for at least four years, a share that has increased by three percentage points from last year.

    The substitarian demographic has an almost equal gender split, comprising 29% of women and 27% of men (the former’s share is down by two points, the latter’s is up by four). And of these consumers, most skew young and come from urban areas in all the different language-speaking regions. Among those under 29, 42% enjoy vegan alternatives several times a month, while for people over 60 – who actually follow a flexitarian diet most often – only 19% are substitarians.

    There’s also a trend of reduction over elimination here: 65% of respondents combine plant-based and animal-derived products in the same meal, whether that’s consciously or unconsciously, indicating an opportunity for blended meat products in the country. It would be one way to continue the increased uptake of plant-based alternatives – the number of respondents who haven’t tried a meat analogue reduced from nearly half (49%) in 2021 to 44% in 2023.

    What are the drivers of veganism in Switzerland?

    planted
    Courtesy: Planted

    For Swiss people, climate change is the most important factor in the consumption of plant-based products – this reason was cited by 67% of flexitarians, 63% of substitarians, 68% of vegetarians, and 66% of vegans. Interestingly, while this driver remains top in the first three categories, it suffered a 15-point decline among people who are already vegan, coming in second behind animal welfare (69%).

    This was the second-biggest motivating factor for vegetarians (67%) and flexitarians (54%) as well, though it came in third place for substitarians (50%), marginally beaten by health (51%). Health was third on the list of priorities for flexitarians (53%), but fell behind other factors for those already on a meatless diet. For vegans and vegetarians, it’s the fifth-most pertinent reason to eat plant-based alternatives, behind ethical motivations and a lack of desire to eat meat.

    Meanwhile, price has become an increasingly crucial consideration, after a couple of years of high inflation due to the elevated cost of living globally. Its importance has climbed by 11 points for vegetarians and six points for vegans, and is cited by 19-24% of Switzerland’s population as a reason to eat more plant-based alternatives.

    In terms of the climate change metric, this is most relevant to young flexitarians, with its value increasing by 10 points over last year. For people aged 45 and above, health is the primary component. Health is also by far the most important thing for people in Ticino, the Italian-speaking region of Switzerland, being cited almost twice as much as the other factors. This makes sense, considering that health is the top driver for the intake of plant-based alternatives in Italy, with 49% of respondents to the EU Smart Protein 2023 survey selecting it

    Which products and labels work best?

    betty bossi
    Courtesy: Coop Switzerland

    Coop Switzerland’s research shed light upon people’s attitudes towards product labels. The term ‘vegan’ is attractive to just a quarter of Swiss consumers, but ‘plant-based’ appeals to about half of them. This is perhaps because the former is associated with ‘expensive’, and the latter more strongly linked to health (both have connotations of ‘trendy’ and environmental protection).

    In terms of products, the overall plant-based dairy category is still dwarfed by the livestock industry, capturing just 3.7% of the total share. But from Coop’s own sales data, vegan alternatives accounted for 17% of total dairy sales, meaning one in six milks bought at its stores is plant-based. Oat milk dominates this category, responsible for 58% of total alt-milk sales. This is followed by soy (18%) and nut milks (16%).

    In terms of meat analogues, schnitzels rule the roost, followed by shredded/sliced meats and sausages. Burgers, once a category leader, have dropped off over the last two years – despite that fall, they have experienced a 279% growth in sales since 2018. Similar numbers exist for shredded meats (+304%), meatballs (+293%) and charcuterie items (+204%) in that period.

    Overall, more and more vegan substitutes are being bought at Coop Switzerland, prompting nearly 70% of respondents to say they’ll be either maintaining or upping their intake of these products in five years’ time. This rises to 83% for 15- to 29-year-olds, and 93% for substitarians.

    Courtesy: TiNDLE Foods

    These figures have likely inspired Coop Switzerland’s new consolidated own-label vegan range, Betty Bossi Plant Kitchen (which combines cookbook publisher Betty Bossi’s CPG arm with the retailer’s private-label brands Délicorn and Yolo). The supermarket claims to offer over 2,200 vegetarian products – more than 1,900 of which are vegan – with upwards of 100 meat and fish analogues, 50 plant-based milks, 40 vegan yoghurts, and about 30 dairy-free cheeses.

    “The new branding emphasises that vegetarian and vegan alternatives are now part of the normal diet,”, said Coop brand manager Ivana Guggisberg. “Meat alternatives are no longer niche products, but are bought by a broad section of the population.”

    Switzerland is also home to one of the most well-funded alt-meat companies in Europe: Planted Foods, which has raised over $100M and features an extensive range of chicken SKUs, pulled meats and kebabs. Additionally, Coop recently welcomed TiNDLE Foods’ vegan chicken products in 440 stores, marking a Swiss market debut for the Singapore-based brand in time for Veganuary. These developments – plus Coop’s survey – pinpoint Switzerland as a country receptive to future food producers.

    The post ‘Substitarians’ on the Rise in Switzerland as Meat Consumption Falls: Survey appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 4 Mins Read

    As Arturo Jose Garcia and Allie Molinaro argue, cultivated meat can be a boon for smallholder farmers, not to mention reduce global dependence on antibiotics, decrease the need for dangerous slaughterhouses, and empower a future of delicious, sustainably grown food.

    In December 2020, a Singaporean restaurant grabbed worldwide headlines by serving the first commercially available cultivated meat. This was also the first time a country approved the sale of cultivated meat, which many hoped would signify a shift in the way we raise and consume animal-sourced food. Still, its acceptance on diners’ plates, in restaurant critics’ write-ups, and the flood of new funding to other cultivated meat companies meant for the first time the just transition of food was seen as an immediate possibility.  

    Fast forward to 2024, it is clear that food systems change is no longer an option, but a necessity. That sentiment echoed through the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28) in Dubai, which wrapped up in mid-December. However, it is also clear there is no silver bullet that will transform our food systems. What we need instead are different but equally important levers that complement one another that, on their own, can’t achieve much, but together they are game-changing. 

    Cultivated meat, one of those necessary levers, promises a more sustainable, healthier, compassionate,  and environmentally friendlier way to produce the meat we love to eat. Imagine real meat, with a fraction of the impact on the environment and animals. Don’t we owe it to ourselves, the animals, and the planet to pull on this lever and give cultivated meat a shot?  

    Unfortunately, there are already efforts to cap the cultivated meat promise by the knees both internationally and here in the United States, likely spearheaded by farming industry groups. But what these groups fail to realize is that cultivated meat is not meant to preclude farming- it was originally meant to operate in tandem with small farmers. In the Netherlands, local farmers grow corn, barley, and wheat that are used to make feed or the cell cultures, and ranchers keep a small herd of cows on pasture who are used for an occasional harmless biopsy. Keeping fewer animals without the need to slaughter them can be a win for smallholder farmers, public health, and worker safety. But cultivated meat bans exacerbate the problems that this promising innovation has the potential to mitigate and solve.  

    In a decentralized model, cultivated meat production can open new market opportunities for small farmers who are currently struggling to compete with mega agribusiness. As it stands, only four highly industrialized companies control each of the beef, pork, and chicken markets. If small farmers who are being outcompeted turn to partner with cultivated meat, they can create a novel value-added market for themselves catered toward more ethically minded consumers. This also removes the headache of finding a slaughterhouse with processing capacity and may improve farmers’ mental well-being as they can allow their animals to live out their natural lifespans, collecting biopsies from the same animal for years until she passes naturally, while still feeding the same amount (or more) people than with traditional cycles of fattening and slaughtering. 

    In addition, keeping fewer animals and raising them on pasture instead of in crowded and unsanitary  Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) and feedlots reduces the need for routine antibiotics.  Currently, industrial agriculture accounts for over two-thirds of the use of medically important antibiotics, which is giving rise to antibiotic resistance. Antibiotic-resistant bacteria kill over 1 million people per year, including 35,000 Americans. However, antibiotic-resistant bacteria are on track to kill 10 million people per year by 2050 without intervention. To put that into perspective, just under seven million people have died from Covid-19 since 2020. In a post-antibiotic world, none of us are safe. Routine procedures such as appendectomies and commonly treatable illnesses such as pneumonia, ear and dental infections, and urinary tract infections become deadly. 

    Finally, eliminating the need for slaughter eliminates the need for notoriously problematic slaughterhouses. Slaughter and processing plants are some of the most dangerous places to work, with the highest amputation and serious injury rates in the U.S. workforce. One worker recently fell into a  machine with corrosive chemicals and suffered severe burns. Occupational Safety and Health  Administration (OSHA) had previously cited the plant with two repeat and six serious violations. Even without injuries, the conditions are terrible. Workers have reported wearing diapers because they were not allowed to go to the bathroom. In 2020, they were a superspreading site for COVID-19 as workers were forced to come in without proper personal protective equipment (PPE). And in recent months,  several U.S. processing plants have come under fire for using child labor

    We need to shift away from industrial animal agriculture, continue to uplift small family farms and regenerative land stewardship, promote diets that are in line with planetary boundaries, and foster the development of alternative proteins and cultivated meat. Food systems solutions must be multifaceted,  drawing from a range of techniques and strategies simultaneously. A system that is not one size fits all but is beneficial for all. Cultivated meat is just one piece of the puzzle in our food systems and a just transition. And with the global population heading towards 10 billion and global meat consumption projected to increase by 50% or more by 2050, it’s all hands on deck.

    The post Cultivated Meat: A Cut Above for Farmers, Health, and Safety appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • arizona lab grown meat
    6 Mins Read

    In yet another move targeted at the alternative protein industry, House representatives in Arizona have proposed bills prohibiting the “misbranding” of meat alternatives and banning cultivated meat altogether. The latter’s legislation would allow people to sue cultured meat companies for up to $100,000 if they hurt their business.

    Two months after a lawmaker in Florida introduced a proposal hoping to be the first US state to ban cultivated meat, Arizona is following suit with its own duo of bills looking to outlaw the production and restrict the labelling

    Arizona House representative Quang Nguyen has drafted HB 2244, a bill that would make it illegal to “intentionally misbrand or misrepresent” an alternative meat product as meat, while fellow Republican David Marshall has gone a step further with an attempt to ban the sale or production of any cultured meat product.

    It’s a step in the opposite direction from the national policy – in June last year, the USDA granted clearance for the production and sale of cultivated chicken to Californian companies Upside Foods and Eat JUST, becoming just the second country to do so (after Singapore). The US is also home to the largest number of publicly announced cultured meat companies, representing 60% of global funding in the space.

    Arizona’s proposed labelling ban

    cultivated meat ban
    Courtesy: Victoria Sergeeva/Canva

    Nguyen’s HB 2244 aims to illegalise the ‘misrepresentation’ of meat on plant-based and cell-cultured products, in the same vein as many other arguments used to ban meat-related terms on alternative protein products globally.

    The bill states that foods “not derived from livestock or poultry” cannot be labelled as poultry or meat products. It suggests that this “misbranding” can be done in several ways, including affixing a false or misleading label, using a historically meat-related term, or representing a product as meat if it “is a cell-cultured food product” or “a synthetic product derived from a plant, insect or other source”.

    The proposed legislation would allow the health department to take complaints and investigate violations, as well as seek injunctions or other civil reliefs to “restrain and prevent violations”. Each day a breach occurs is treated as a separate offence, with a maximum penalty of $100,000 per violation.

    Nguyen told local outlet Capitol Media Services that the bill isn’t intended to block companies from offering or consumers from buying these products, but stressed that it was a matter of transparency and disclosure. “The bill doesn’t ban lab meat,” he said, using a term much derided by the industry. “But if it’s lab meat, it needs to be labelled that. If you don’t want to buy lab meat, then don’t buy it. That’s all.”

    He added that the idea of cultured meat is actually appealing. “There are a lot of poor people out there that actually could use lab meat,” he explained, reflecting on his journey as a refugee from Vietnam who grew up in a low-income household. “If you wanted to throw lab meat up on my table when I was a little kid growing up in the war, I’d be chewing on that.”

    Could Arizona ban cultured meat?

    lab grown meat ban
    Eat JUST’s GOOD Meat is one of only two cultivated meat companies to have received regulatory approval | Courtesy: Eat Just

    Marshall, however, does want to prohibit people from buying or selling cell-cultured meat. In HB 2121, he moves to ban the sale or production of these foods for both human and animal consumption, calling it “a matter of statewide concern necessary to protect public health”.

    There is a noted focus on the cattle industry, which forms one of Arizona’s five Cs of the economy (alongside copper, cotton, citrus and climate). “The production and sale of lab-grown, cell-cultured animal products threaten to harm this state’s trust land beneficiaries and the highest and best use of state trust land, which includes the lease of state lands to ranchers for livestock grazing to fund public schools and other public institutions,” reads the bill.

    Calling the cattle ranching industry “integral to this state’s history, culture, values and economy”, Marshall argues that the ban is “necessary to protect this state’s sovereign interests, history, economy and food heritage” – a tact similar to the one adopted by Italy in its ban on cultured meat.

    Anyone found violating the legislation would be subject to a civil penalty of up to $25,000, but more notable is the stipulation that anyone whose business is “adversely affected” by the sale of cultivated meat can file a suit to stop the act and collect damages of up to $100,000 (plus legal fees).

    The meat-climate disconnect shapes up global bans

    upside foods bar crenn
    Upside Foods’ cultivated chicken is available at Bar Crenn in San Francisco | Courtesy: Upside Foods

    The proposed ban comes a couple of months after Florida House representative Tyler Sirois introduced a bill to ban the production, sale, holding and distribution of cultivated meat in the state, with criminal penalties imposed on violators. It follows Texas governor Greg Abbott’s signing of a bill requiring clear labelling of plant-based and cultivated meat, seafood and egg products, as well as Nebraska’s proposed Real MEAT act mandating the word “imitation” on alt-protein.

    These bills are aimed at protecting America’s livestock industry, which already receives 800 times more funding than plant-based and cultivated meat companies. This is despite cultured meat having a much lower impact on the environment than conventional meat, with alt-protein think tank the Good Food Institute (GFI) predicting that if produced via renewable energy, the former can reduce emissions by 92%, require 95% less land, and use 78% less water than cattle-derived beef.

    But this hasn’t penetrated the viewpoints of most Americans, who eat six times as much red meat as the amount recommended to keep in line with the 1.5°C heating goal (which itself has been breached). In July, a Washington Post and University of Maryland poll found that 74% of Americans don’t believe eating meat has any impact on climate change.

    However, there has been some support from the central government for alternative proteins. The Biden administration has set aside $6M for alt-protein R&D at the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service, while its $10M NIFA grant for alt-protein led to the creation of the Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture in Massachusetts.

    Arizona and Texas should look into following California’s lead – the state is home to both Upside Foods and Eat Just, as well as one of the two restaurants currently serving cultured meat in the country. In July 2022, it became the first state to invest in research for these foods, allocating $5M of the state budget for alt-protein research.

    How Arizona’s bill is received remains to be seen, but climate activists would hope that it doesn’t go the same way as Italy or Romania (which has also voted to prohibit cultured meat, with fines between €40,000 and €60,000). France, meanwhile, is deliberating its own ban.

    “Consumer demand and science-based food safety requirements should determine what’s sold in our supermarkets, not arbitrary government regulation,” GFI policy director Curt Chaffin told Capitol Media Services. “In a time when American farmers and food producers are facing stiff competition around the globe, politicians should not be policing what’s made and sold in Arizona.”

    The post Arizona Republicans Attempt to Ban Cultured Meat with Two New Bills appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • vegan mac and cheese
    8 Mins Read

    Boxed, frozen, or in a cup, vegan mac and cheese brands ensure there’s something for everyone – here are nine of the best.

    I’ve made my share of vegan mac and cheese recipes – whether it’s cashew- and cauliflower-based sauce or a veganised version of a quick mac, you can never really go wrong with this classic.

    But sometimes you just want to do things Cliff Booth-style after a hard day of work and are in need of some comfort food, stat. There are tons of brands catering to people looking for quick mac and cheese – whether it’s a boxed mix, a cup noodle-style format, or ready-to-eat.

    This has also extended to plant-based versions of the pasta dish, with companies innovating with various ingredients to come up with offerings that surprise and delight in both healthful and indulgent ways. Here are some of the best brands making vegan mac and cheese.

    Annie’s

    annies mac and cheese
    Courtesy: Annie’s Homegrown

    General Mills-owned Annie’s Homegrown has been around for 35 years now, so it’s safe to say it knows what it’s doing. The brand’s vegan Macaroni & Cheddar Flavor is a boxed variety combining dried pasta and a vegan Cheddar seasoning made from rice syrup, cornstarch, pea protein, organic palm oil, annotto and rosemary extracts (among others).

    Annie’s promises you can make this in 10 minutes. Boil the macaroni the way you usually do (al dente is the way to go), and meanwhile, boil a third of a cup of plant-based milk alongside the vegan cheese seasoning. Once done, drain and add the pasta to the mix, and voila!

    One 6oz box contains 2.5 servings, and being a boxed option, it can stay on the shelf for ages. In addition, Annie’s has a shells and sweet potato-pumpkin flavour, as well as two gluten-free boxed variants: rice pasta and Cheddar, and red lentil spirals and sweet potato-pumpkin. Plus, it has a Deluxe Rich & Creamy shelled pasta and Cheddar flavour, where you just need to mix a pre-made cheese sauce straight into hot cooked pasta.

    You can buy Annie’s Vegan Macaroni & Cheddar at Target, Publix and Sprouts for $2.99.

    Wicked Kitchen

    wicked kitchen mac and cheese
    Courtesy: Wicked Kitchen

    British brand Wicked Kitchen has a host of mac and cheese varieties for people to choose from. Its Spicy Smoky Dreamy Mac is an ode to cup noodles and one of the quickest ways to enjoy a vegan mac and cheese. Soy protein, potato starch, maltodextrin and coconut extract are blended with spices and seasoning to recreate the flavours of a conventional cheesy mac – all you have to do is add boiling water, stir thoroughly, and wait seven minutes.

    Wicked Kitchen also offers a mac and cheese cup with potato and beans and a frozen Rockin’ Chili Mac. Plus, it has a full range of boxed varieties in BBQ King, Smoky Picnic and This is Nacho flavours, with rice milk powder playing a key role here. These are also packed with a whopping 17g of protein per serving.

    You can buy Wicked Kitchen’s vegan mac and cheeses at multiple retailers across the US, starting from $3.49.

    Goodles

    goodles
    Courtesy: Goodles

    The Gal Gadot-owned brand Goodles offers something different: a good-for-you mac and cheese. Headlined by 12g of protein, 7g of prebiotic fibre, and 21 nutrients extracted from plants, the vegan mac and cheese uses a base of cashew milk, chicory fibre and nutritional yeast to take things up a notch on the flavour scale.

    Even the pasta contains chickpea and wheat proteins. A take on a boxed Cheddar mac and cheese, Goodles’ Vegan is Believin’ comes with macaroni and a white Cheddar mix. As with other boxed varieties, cook the pasta until al dente, and drain while you prepare the sauce. Goodles recommends adding a third of a cup of milk alongside 1.5 tablespoons of vegan butter – heat it up and add the Cheddar once done.

    You can buy Goodles’ Vegan is Believin’ mac and cheese directly from its website for $56.33 for a 12-pack.

    Upton’s Naturals

    vegan mac and cheese recipe
    Courtesy: Upton’s Naturals

    One of the cleanest labels you’ll see on a box of mac and cheese, Upton’s Naturals lives up to its name here. A mainstay at its Liberation Kitchen restaurant in Chicago, the brand’s two mac and cheeses come in a different format than most – they’re pre-cooked and ready to heat.

    The Original Ch’eesy Mac contains drum wheat semolina, nutritional yeast, rice bran oil, sea salt, cornstarch, mustard, onion, garlic, paprika, turmeric and sugar, while the bacon version sees the addition of a smoky seitan bacon (with vital wheat gluten, soy sauce, wheat flour and liquid smoke being the additional ingredients).

    Crack open the two packs inside the box, and heat directly on a pan for three to five minutes (or until warm). You could also cook it for a further five to seven minutes (or until golden brown) for a more caramelised flavour. It’s a perfect weeknight dinner for two.

    You can buy Upton’s Natural’s mac and cheeses online via FakeMeats.com or Amazon, at various retailers nationwide, or at Liberation Kitchen in Chicago, starting from $5.99.

    Daiya

    daiya mac and cheese
    Courtesy: Daiya

    Vegan cheese giant Daiya has recently overhauled its entire product line, switching from a chickpea protein base to fermented oat cream. This has also extended to its mac and cheese line, which is in the process of being replaced and replenished with the new formulations.

    So far, the mac and cheeses that have been revamped are the classic Cheddar, White Cheddar, Alfredo and Four Cheese and Herbs variants. They both contain rice flour pasta to keep the product gluten-free, with filtered water, coconut oil, safflower oil, oat flour and tapioca starch combined with seasonings and gums for a rounded flavour.

    To make these pastas, boil the macaroni until al dente, drain and return to the pot (saving some of the starchy water), and fold in the Daiya cheese sauce until fully mixed and warmed.

    You can find Daiya’s new vegan macaroni and cheese at various retailers across the US, starting from $4.17.

    Pastabilities

    pastabilities
    Courtesy: Pastabilities

    With a three-strong lineup of boxed vegan mac and cheese, Pastabilities’ products cater to both kids and adults. Its younger-demographic-skewed products swap the macaroni for playful Ruffled and Sea Creature shapes. They contain fortified wheat flour pasta and a vegan Cheddar seasoning made from ingredients including maltodextrin, cornstarch, organic palm oil, rice syrup and pea protein.

    Meanwhile, for the adults, there’s a Protein Pasta & Vegan Cheese variety, which makes use of a wheat flour pasta enriched with chickpea and pea proteins, soy protein concentrate and wheat protein isolate, alongside vitamins and minerals. The sauce remains the same as the other pastas, but the bulked-up pasta means it packs 22g of protein per serving, alongside 6g of dietary fibre.

    The brand recommends a base of a third of a cup of almond milk and 2.5 tbsp of vegan butter, with the cheese mix added a little at a time as it heats. Add cooked pasta to this pot and you’re golden.

    You can buy Pastabilities’ vegan mac and cheeses directly from its website, or at various retailers across the US, from $6.99.

    Field Roast

    cho mac and cheese
    Courtesy: Field Roast

    Field Roast’s cult-favourite vegan cheese Chao is the star of its frozen Mac ‘n Chao offering. The ready-to-heat dish contains enriched flour pasta, Chao’s Original flavour slices with fermented tofu and olive extract, plus nutritional yeast, modified cornstarch, spices and hot sauce.

    It’s a microwave meal reminiscent of Kevin McCallister in Home Alone – remove the overwrap and cover the dish, then microwave on high for four minutes, before stirring and heating for a further minute to two. It’s irresistibly quick and equally delicious.

    You can find Field Roast’s Creamy Mac ‘n Chao online and at various retailers across the US.

    Kraft Heinz Not Company

    kraft vegan mac and cheese
    Courtesy: The Kraft Heinz Company

    It had to be here. The brand synonymous with mac and cheese has finally introduced a dairy-free mac and cheese, which has begun rolling out in the US now (a version of this has been available in Australia since 2021). Born out of a partnership with Chilean food tech startup NotCo, the Kraft NotMac&Cheese comes in two flavours: Original and White Cheddar.

    The plant-based version of the iconic boxed mac and cheese contains a base of faba bean protein isolate and coconut oil powder, with a surprising ingredient in dried pineapple too. Do I really need to tell you how to make this?

    You can find Kraft Heinz Not Company’s NotMac&Cheese at various retailers across the US for $3.99.

    Bonus: Howl

    howl vegan mac and cheese
    Courtesy: Howl

    A “chef-driven” brand, Howl was taken over by Penguin Natural Foods in 2023, which promised to release a new and updated version of its vegan mac and cheese line.

    While still described as ‘coming soon’, the two gluten-free pastas come in Sharp Cheddar and Spicy Chipotle flavours with a cashew milk base. It’s also a clean-label box of mac and cheese, with the pasta containing white and brown rice flours, and the seasonings include nutritional yeast, cashews, salt, onion, garlic, lactic acid, yeast extract and annatto seed (the latter also has chipotle chillies).

    Howl recommends starting with boiling pasta for 10-12 minutes, before draining and returning to the pan. Here, you stir in one-third cup of plant-based milk, 2 tbsp vegan butter and the seasoning packet for one minute, or until the sauce is creamy.

    Howl’s vegan mac and cheese products are coming soon.

    The post Smmmile, It’s Plant-Based!: The 9 Best Vegan Mac and Cheese Brands appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • uc davis alt protein
    6 Mins Read

    In collaboration with other institutions and government bodies, the University of California, Davis is launching an Integrative Center for Alternative Meat and Protein to research and accelerate the commercialisation of alternative proteins. Can it help UC Davis shrug off its pro-livestock reputation?

    UC Davis is leading the launch of the new Integrative Center for Alternative Meat and Protein (iCAMP) in collaboration with the USDA, UCLA, the University of Maryland Baltimore County, Solano Community College, and the Culinary Institute of America.

    The Center will bring together leading researchers, academic institutions, industry professionals, advocacy groups and food innovators, who will work towards the large-scale commercialisation and technological advancement of alternative proteins. These include cultivated meat, plant-based and fugal foods, as well as blended meat products.

    Globally, our demand for meat is expected to increase by 50-100% over the next 25 years, according to iCAMP director David Block. But meat accounts for 60% of food system emissions and has a much higher impact on land and water use than most plant-based foods. “Expansion of conventional animal agriculture is unlikely to be able to meet demand at a reasonable price,” said Block. “We have to come up with alternatives and create additional sustainable food sources.”

    david block
    David Block. Courtesy: UC Davis

    Targeting future protein’s challenges

    At iCAMP, researchers will explore ways to increase consumer acceptance and preference for future proteins, which will give companies a deeper understanding of their needs and help them develop highly desirable products tailored to a varied set of customers. These applications can be across flavour, nutrition, shelf life and stability, cooking properties, cost, and more.

    The Center acknowledges that the future protein sector continues to face challenges, citing flavour and texture are key obstacles. A recent Mintel survey showed that taste is the biggest reason (48%) for Americans’ reticence to try alt-meat. As a spokesperson for vegan meat leader Impossible Foods told Green Queen this past November: “Taste is the #1 reason why consumers will decide to purchase a product again or not. Many consumers have unfortunately had a less-than-positive first impression of various plant-based products, and that casts doubt on the rest of the category as a whole.”

    Then there’s the price parity question – especially with cultivated meat, which needs significant scaling up to attempt to match the costs of conventionally produced meat. Cultured meat needs to reach production costs of $2.92 per lb to be price-competitive with traditional meat, and while companies have managed to cut manufacturing costs by 99% in less than a decadeMcKinsey analysis estimates that it will still take until 2030 for these proteins to reach parity.

    This is echoed by Block: “We are not to the point where the product is anywhere near the cost of conventional meat. Widespread distribution of affordable products is likely to take 10 to 15 years.” He also leads the UC Davis Cultivated Meat Consortium, where scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs and educators are developing tech to grow animal cells in a cheaper and more efficient manner.

    turtletree
    Courtesy: Turtletree

    Why UC Davis has been criticised for its stance on meat

    While undoubtedly a positive sign for the industry, UC Davis does have a chequered history when it comes to alternative protein. Frank Mitloehner, the head of an agricultural research center at the university, led an online backlash against the 2019 Eat-Lancet report that recommended cutting back on red meat to help save the planet. The same year, he promoted a quiz comparing the ingredients of the Beyond Burger to premium dog food, an online campaign run by meat industry interest groups.

    Mitloehner has emerged as an anti-alternative protein campaigner backed by the animal agriculture industry. According to the New York Times, his Clear Center receives nearly all its funding from industry donations (including $2.9M from the Institute for Feed Education and Research and nearly $200,000 from the California Cattle Council) and works with a livestock lobby group on messaging campaigns.

    But it’s not just Mitloehner who has been perpetuating such ideas. A group of researchers at UC Davis – described as “a well-known Big Ag conspirator“ by the marketing campaign body Changing Markets Foundation – released a pre-print, non-peer-reviewed paper last year claiming that cell-cultured meat is 25 times worse for the environment than beef, which went viral on social media.

    ud davis lab grown meat
    Courtesy: Changing Markets Foundation

    The study suggested that a vegan agenda is causing wildlife loss, barren Earth, and soil damage, going on to accuse “elite organisations” like the WEF of lying about animal agriculture’s environmental impact. These claims have been used to promote the narrative that people should eat more beef, and were promoted by American conservative figures like Donald Trump Jr and Tomi Lahren.

    The paper had an impact on policy too. In Ireland, when the government was considering culling 200,000 dairy cows over three years as part of its push to cut agri-emissions by 25%, the UC Davis study was used to push back on the proposal, as critics blamed cultivated meat for its alleged contribution to the climate crisis. (The 25% reduction target currently remains in place, but proposals to achieve it still need to be confirmed.)

    For what it’s worth, alternative protein think tank the Good Food Institute carried out a life-cycle assessment in 2021 showing that cultivated meat can save up to 91% of greenhouse gas emissions when compared to animal-derived meat.

    Collaboration and funding is key

    uc davis cultivated meat
    Courtesy: UC Davis

    UC Davis – which also serves as the R&D headquarters for Singaporean precision fermentation startup TurtleTree – was among the first academic institutions to receive federal funding for cultivated meat research in 2022, when the state of California provided $5M in funding to UCLA, UC Berkeley and UC Davis. The $1.67M received by the latter’s Cultivated Meat Consortium is being used to start iCAMP, with the consortium becoming an internal part of the new alt-protein center.

    iCAMP will focus on workforce development too, which includes cases and education for students and professionals to help propel the sector forward. Here, industry partners will play a key role by directing and financing research projects. Through this atmosphere of collaboration and knowledge exchange, the center aims to develop breakthrough technologies, cut production costs, increase scalability, and ultimately make alternative proteins more accessible globally.

    Additionally, researchers are working with industry and regional developers to build a “more complete ecosystem” of food tech business incubators, pilot facilities and contract manufacturers, with innovative ways to connect with the public. These range from food policy seminars to introducing consumers to novel meat products in campus dining areas and beyond.

    To that end, iCAMP will launch on January 17 with an Innovation Day at the UC Davis Robert Mondavi Center for Wine and Food Science, where scientists, programme leads and partners will share research to accelerate alt-protein innovation. It will include discussions on plant-, fermentation-, and cell-based foods, as well as food safety, consumer acceptance, and regulation and policy. Plus, there will be a focus on supporting businesses and academic institution IP, and building regional bioprocessing and workforce capacity.

    The post UC Davis Launches Alternative Protein Center to Advance Commercialisation appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • veggie grill next level burger
    4 Mins Read

    In one of the largest M&A deals in the US plant-based space, Next Level Burger has acquired fast-casual chain Veggie Grill. The move comes a year after the latter was saved from bankruptcy, and makes Next Level Burger the largest fast-casual vegan chain in North America.

    Plant-based burger chain Next Level Burger has acquired vegan restaurant group Veggie Grill from VegInvest, an investment fund that rescued the latter from the brink of collapse last year. The move will see VegInvest join Next Level Burger as a shareholder and partner.

    The acquisition makes Next Level Burger the largest vegan fast-casual chain in North America with 27 locations, after adding Veggie Grill’s 17 sites to its existing roster of 10. “We’re not just writing a new chapter for Veggie Grill – we’re starting a new book,” said Next Level Burger co-founder and CEO Matt de Gruyter.

    De Gruyter will also take over from Veggie Grill co-founder and CEO TK Pillan, who will exit the company alongside fellow co-founders Ray White and Kevin Boylan. It’s a sea change for a brand that nearly collapsed last year “after some decisions led to a make-or-break moment for its continuance”.

    Next Level Burger’s expansion drive

    next level burger
    Courtesy: Next Level Burger

    Next Level Burger was launched by de Gruyter and his wife Cierra in 2014 as a mission-driven restaurant chain aligning human health, ecological sustainability, and an ethical supply chain. “Since our founding in 2014, our company mission has been focused on a triple bottom line philosophy of doing good, having fun and making money,” de Gruyter said in 2022.

    A decade after its launch, the company is present in eight cities nationwide, with six in-store locations at Whole Foods Market. Next Level Burger says it has stopped nearly 60 million lbs of carbon emissions from being released into the atmosphere, converted almost two billion gallons of fresh water, and supported “acres and acres” of organic farmland.

    While a 100% plant-based brand, 53% of Next Level Burger’s customers don’t identify as vegan, according to a 339-person survey it carried out last year. In fact, a fifth of respondents said they would have eaten a meat-based dish at another eatery or home had they not eaten at the vegan burger joint, underscoring its efficacy in displacing animal-sourced foods with plant-based.

    Its acquisition of Veggie Grill comes 16 months after it raised $20M to fund its expansion plans – the fast-food chain hopes to open 1,000 locations in the long term. “Veggie Grill by Next Level will mean all sorts of changes: organic produce, non-GMO ingredients and ensuring living wages for our many team members across the country,” said de Gruyter. “Everything guests know and love about Veggie Grill is about to be taken to the Next Level, but know that the fan favourites aren’t going anywhere.”

    Overcoming a tumultuous period

    veggie grill
    Courtesy: Veggie Grill

    Veggie Grill, which was founded in Irvine, California in 2006, has been a leader in the US plant-based foodservice sector ever since. The restaurant chain is known for partnering with vegan brands on innovative dishes, including Yo Eggs, Beyond Meat and TiNDLE Foods.

    But much like the overall vegan market in the country, the company has faced significant headwinds recently. While it currently has 17 locations, Veggie Grill boasted 29 only a few months ago. But a drop in post-pandemic office-worker footfall meant it had to cut over 40% of its foodservice footprint.

    “Instead of trying to continue to manage units that, without office traffic, would not be profitable, we determined it would be a better long-term move to right-size our fleet of restaurants,” Pillan explained to Food Dive in September. “This allows us to really focus on the restaurants where the economics are strong, continue to focus on innovating on the menu, and then grow into other locations based on this new world of how consumers really use fast-casual restaurants.”

    In 2021, it launched a second dining concept called Stand-Up Burgers, citing growing consumer demand. But this brand diverted Veggie Grill’s energy and did not turn the tide around for its quieter locations, as Pillan had hoped. He spoke of the difficulty of creating “just one great brand, let alone two”, adding that closing Stand-Up Burgers would allow the company to refocus on its core offerings. (Veggie Grill also operates vegan taqueria Más Veggies, which has 16 locations nationwide.)

    Veggie Grill’s struggle mirrors that of the wider plant-based industry, where major brands like Beyond Meat have faced continuous losses, while some have shut operations. And while one report revealed that foodservice sales for plant-based meat reached an all-time high in the US, pound sales still haven’t reached pre-pandemic levels, with restaurants like VeganBurg (San Francisco), Love.Life (Los Angeles), Souley Vegan (Oakland), Stalk & Spade (Minnesota) and Citizen Eatery (Austin) all closing down in 2023.

    But on the back of its Veggie Grill acquisition, Next Level Burger’s de Gruyter remains optimistic about the industry. “I believe in my bones that the exponential growth of the plant-based industry is an inevitability,” he told Green Queen. “We are on the right side of history, from climate change to human and planetary health, and the science is clear that the future of sustainability requires a shift toward eating plant-based. Our millions of guests served to date seem to agree, and we’re just getting started.”

    The post Next Level Burger Acquires Veggie Grill to Become North America’s Largest Fast-Casual Vegan Chain appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • cultured meat singapore
    8 Mins Read

    Singapore is renowned for its position as an alternative protein leader – a new study reveals how members of the general public as well as scientific experts feel about cultured meat, and its effects on general health and society.

    Soon, it will be three years since the Singapore Food Agency granted Eat Just’s Good Meat the world’s first regulatory approval for cultivated meat. It consolidated the island nation’s position as a flagbearer of food tech innovation and progressive policymaking.

    It has led to an influx of startups across all the alternative protein pillars, with Singapore being home to the highest number of companies across biomass fermentation (39%), cultivated (33%) and plant-based (21%) startups in APAC. In fact, at least 25 non-local companies have a presence in the city-state for R&D and business development, with 24% of all APAC alt-protein startups based here.

    This is according to industry think tank the Good Food Institute APAC’s State of the Industry report for 2023, which also highlighted how consumers in Singapore are the most sceptical of plant-based meat (alongside Malaysians). The country has the highest number of ‘rejectors’ as well, i.e. people who want to reduce their intake of meat alternatives.

    In a similar vein is a recent study published in the Plos One journal, which looked at how the public as well as scientific experts view cultivated meat in Singapore. It relied upon focus group discussions attended by 29 members of the public and 11 experts from research institutes and academia, with each session lasting about two hours.

    What the public thinks

    lab grown meat tasting
    Courtesy: Eat Just

    Public members discussed two main health benefits of cultivated meat: functional foods and higher food safety, with the nature of the product meaning it could be engineered to be more nutritious and healthier than conventional meat. Produced in bioreactors, cell-cultured meat is also thought of as cleaner and carries a lower risk of transmitting zoonotic diseases. Additionally, the general public believed that cultivated meat could provide expanded options for meat-eaters, while potentially being more wallet-friendly as increased demand would mean lower prices for conventional meat.

    In terms of societal benefits, food security was identified as a key benefit, especially given Singapore’s heavy reliance on imports – over 90% of its food supply comes from other countries. Cultured meat can help the country grow its own meat and become more self-sufficient, all the while diversifying its food sources, and mitigating supply chain vulnerabilities. It could help address food shortages and malnutrition too.

    This, in turn, would bring benefits to the economy, with reduced meat imports, increased foreign direct investments and more jobs being mentioned as three key aspects. Plus, there’s the land use question: GFI analysis reveals that cultured meat grown via renewable energy needs 95% less land than conventional meat. As a land-scarce nation, public participants said cultured meat can alleviate this challenge, further noting wider environmental positives, alongside animal welfare benefits.

    Despite the idea that cultivated meat could help avoid zoonotic diseases and be a cleaner food source, many expressed concerns about the long-term effects of these novel proteins on human health, with apprehensions stemming from the use of additives and preservatives, doubts over nutritional deficiencies, as well as a perceived naturalness. Others are unsure about the science, processing methods, and regulations governing its production. And for many consumers, price is a key barrier, calling it the primary factor influencing their purchasing decisions.

    There were also worries about health effects at a societal level, with questions raised around the transparency and qualifications of cultured meat suppliers, as well as the overconsumption of these proteins, which was likened to high diet soda intake. Finally, resistance from religious communities was identified as a potential societal risk too, as certain racial and ethnic groups could find cultured meat adoption challenging. There is a need for relevant certification to enhance acceptance, as has been the case with cultured meat’s halal certification.

    Mirte Gosker, managing director of the Good Food Institute APAC, compares this situation to the shift to electric vehicles (EVs). “For EVs, initial market hesitations surrounded vehicle costs, battery range, and concerns about a lack of available chargers, which consumers worried could affect how reliably they can get from place to place,” she explains. “Those are challenges that EV producers, researchers, and governments all took seriously and began investing in solutions to mitigate, which has helped alleviate consumer hesitation in many markets.”

    She adds: “There will be a long learning curve as consumers weigh how cultivated meat could potentially fit into their lives with minimal disruption to their existing day-to-day practices.”

    What scientific experts think

    uk sustainable proteins
    Courtesy: Shiok Meats

    In terms of cultivated meat experts, there were two main upsides for personal health: individual health benefits and increased food options. There was talk about how cultured meat could be improved with certain bio-nutrients and mitigate risks traditionally associated with animal meat, such as pesticide exposure. The experts echoed the public’s point about an expansion of choices, providing consumers with a chance to “diversify our diet”.

    When it comes to societal benefits, the predominant topic of discussion was food security, with experts viewing it as a significant advantage of cell-based meat. These proteins can offer stability during supply chain disruptions and ensure the continuity of food production, becoming “a valuable benefit for society”.

    However, the experts did raise concerns about personal health risks, with some feeling the tech is still immature and more long-term research is necessary. Gosker explains that it is “a professional requirement for scientific experts to have questions, especially for a new technology like cultivated meat”. She points to the safety assessments made by the FDA in the US, the FSA in Singapore and the FSANZ in Oceania, as well as a 2023 UN FAO report that concluded: “The food safety risks of [cultivated] meat are similar to those of conventional meat, and they can be contained through proper handling and testing as with conventional meat.”

    “In the study, the open questions outlined by scientific experts – which were outnumbered by the potential benefits they noted for food safety and security – mostly pertain to market acceptance and driving down the costs of cultivated meat production through investment and innovation,” she tells Green Queen. “These are anticipated growing pains and challenges that GFI’s global teams are proactively working to resolve through technical guidance and open-access R&D funding, but there is also a clear need for governments around the world to play a much larger role.”

    There were affordability considerations at play as well, as cultured meat products are much more expensive than their conventional counterparts, which is a major barrier to widespread adoption and acceptance. Investment risks were brought up as well by the experts in focus groups, calling the industry “challenging” and a “commercial liability”, and noting that most vegetarians would not be inclined to eat cell-cultured meat.

    Speaking to this, Gosker explains: “Just as the clean energy transition requires and deserves public investment, so does our transition to alternative proteins. For perspective, the cultivated meat sector has received – over the course of its entire history as an industry – less than $3B in global investment, 98% of which have been equity investments across more than 100 companies. That is less than the cost of one single EV battery plant. This illustrates just how early in the scale-up and cost-reduction processes the industry is at this stage and how much more room it still has for growth.”

    Differences, similarities and misconceptions

    lab grown meat singapore
    Courtesy: Eat Just

    Both the public and experts displayed similarities as well as differences in their perception of these novel foods. For example, both sets of focus group participants agreed that cultured meat presents personal health benefits, expands food options, and ensures food security. Similarly, they expressed concern about long-term health risks and affordability.

    But the general public held a much broader view of societal risks and benefits compared to the experts, who did so for personal health risks. For instance, when it came to the societal aspects, the general public mentioned benefits for land use, animal welfare, and the Singapore economy, as well as risks around public health and potential resistance from certain racial and religious communities – ideas not mentioned by the experts, highlighting the key considerations of consumers.

    It’s a topic GFI APAC’s industry-wide surveys have highlighted, given that huge swathes of Asia’s population adhere to such religious standards. “It is essential for religious bodies and third-party certification agencies to work closely with regulators and industry stakeholders to determine how cultivated meat and seafood producers can best align with their requirements,” says Gosker.

    The study also exposed some misconceptions surrounding cultivated meat. Some members of the public associated these proteins with plant-based meat. And while they thought of cultured meat as environmentally beneficial, experts were more sceptical due to a lack of sufficient scientific evidence. “Open-access research publications provide increased transparency about the cultivated meat production process, which could be beneficial in clarifying for consumers how novel foods get to their plate,” says Gosker.

    “Public information campaigns by trusted government agencies and experts can be very effective in dispelling misinformation and educating consumers about the many health benefits of cultivated meat,” she adds.

    Key questions lie for cultured meat in Singapore

    cultivated seafood
    Courtesy: Umami Bioworks

    “In previous consumer perception studies, many Asian consumers have expressed a strong desire to try products that they perceive to be innovative or deliver added values not previously available to them,” says Gosker. “This could give a boost to brands that use novel ingredients and formulations, such as hybrid products that combine ingredients from plants, microbes and cultivated animal cells to create flavourful and nutrient-dense products and ingredients.

    “Such products will have a much easier time achieving price parity in the short term, while scientists continue to refine techniques for cost efficiency on fully cultivated products. Not surprisingly, Singapore has proven to be an early global leader in advancing the hybrid protein space.”

    So, where does that all leave us? Gosker says the study is a useful blueprint for how similar research can be conducted in other APAC countries. She also mentions the importance of tackling food neophobia, and how producers and governments can increase consumer confidence in cultivated meat. Many of these steps were highlighted in a landmark report by the UNEP published during this year’s COP28.

    Ultimately, she notes, the question is: “Can cultivated meat deliver all of the flavour, value, and nutrition that consumers currently get from conventional meat? If it can, and the products come with clearly communicated benefits like a complete absence of microplastics and reduced risk of transmitting zoonotic disease, many consumers will see the value in making the switch.”

    The post How Do Singapore’s Consumers & Experts Feel About Cultivated Meat? appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • plant based meat thailand
    7 Mins Read

    Two-thirds of Thailand’s population wants to eat less meat over the next two years and replace it with plant-based alternatives, according to a new survey. Health and nutrition are the main motivators, while price and availability remain key barriers.

    While three-quarters of people in Thailand eat meat and 18% are already reducing their intake, two-thirds are hoping to cut their consumption of animal proteins in the next two years, according to a new survey conducted by Madre Brava through Northstar/HarrisX.

    Polling more than 1,500 consumers in Thailand, the research found that respondents in Thailand – only 1% of whom are vegan and 2% vegetarian – would like to replace meat with either traditional plant proteins (44%) or novel alternatives (29%), as well as a mix of both (28%). And health is the primary driver for this decision, followed by the environment and animal welfare.

    Environmental issues less concerning for Thai consumers

    thailand meat consumption
    Courtesy: Madre Brava

    The research revealed that awareness of both traditional plant proteins (like tofu, seitan, TVP and beans) and meat alternatives is high, with 72% familiar with the former and 43% with the latter. Similarly, 39% have heard of vegan seafood, despite a lower number of people intending to reduce conventional fish consumption over the next two years (49%).

    Among the consumers who have tried alternative proteins (89%), 41% are looking to increase their intake of these products, while 16% want to reduce it. Of the 11% who haven’t eaten alt-proteins, 63% want to up their consumption.

    Health is paramount for Thais, with both negative and positive associations of alt-proteins highlighting this factor: 63% believe meat alternatives are healthier, but 70% find them too processed. Price and taste are key too, with 64% associating them with a higher cost than animal-derived meat and 56% saying they don’t taste as good.

    “From the latest numbers, it is clear that Thai consumers are a group that places high importance on health compared to many other countries, and are aware that reducing meat and consuming plant-based protein instead will have a positive effect,” said Jacques-Chai Chomthongdi, Southeast Asia director at Madre Brava.

    “This coincides with environmental imperatives, especially climate change, due to the high greenhouse gas emissions of animal protein production,” he added. It’s something echoed by Thailand’s consumers, with 72% calling plant-based meat better for the environment than its conventional counterpart.

    thailand deforestation
    Courtesy: Madre Brava

    But despite that, environmental issues are a less pressing concern for Thai consumers than health and wellbeing, poverty, and the cost-of-living crisis. And when it comes to climate change, respondents see deforestation (69%) and plastic use (52%) as the main causes, with only 13% finding industrial meat as a major driver. This is because four in 10 Thai people don’t know a lot about the animal agriculture industry, which is responsible for 11-19.5% of global emissions.

    The survey also compared Thai attitudes towards meat-eating with global markets (UK, France, Germany, US and Brazil), finding that the average number of people who believe they’ll reduce or stop eating meat in the next two years is 46%, versus 67% for Thailand. Conversely, while only 9% of Thai people say they will not be eating alt-protein in this timeframe, it’s much lower than the international average of 27%.

    Among the 33% of survey respondents who don’t intend to cut their meat consumption, around a third say it’s because meat-eating is normal and ubiquitous, and necessary for our health. A further 18% say it’s natural (“humans have been doing it forever”), and 14% find it pleasurable. This is still, however, lower than the global average, where 17% say it’s normal (versus 32% in Thailand), and 32% call meat-eating nice.

    Health the largest driver of alt-protein consumption in Thailand

    vegan in thailand
    Courtesy: Madre Brava

    The research pinpointed 18 drivers of consumption of alt-proteins, grouped into eight themes. These were health and nutrition (they’re healthier and safer with accurate nutrition info on packaging), environment (they’re less harmful and emit fewer GHG emissions), farmer welfare (they can benefit local and Indigenous producers more), animal welfare, price, sensory attributes (they taste, feel, look and smell just as good as conventional meat), convenience (they’re easy to cook and come in diverse formats), and availability (they can be found at local stores, supermarkets, street vendors, online services, as well as restaurants).

    Health and nutrition were the most influential factors, with 57% finding that alt-proteins are better for their health than animal-derived meat, 48% saying they’re safer and eliminate the risk of bacterial infection, and 32% calling on-pack nutritional info accurate and trustworthy. In contrast, sensory qualities and availability represent the lowest growth drivers for consumption, with only 9% likening their texture to conventional proteins and 8% finding them easily available in convenience stores, supermarkets and street markets. In fact, only 1% and 2% say they smell and look the same as animal proteins, respectively.

    madre brava
    Courtesy: Madre Brava

    In terms of consumption barriers, the research identified 15 factors grouped into seven categories: health and nutrition (they aren’t as nutritious or natural, are highly processed, or people would rather eat whole plant foods), farmer welfare, lack of information (people don’t know where to buy them, how to incorporate them, or just don’t know enough about them), price, sensory aspects (they don’t taste or feel nice or resemble like conventional meat, or respondents don’t want them to replicate animal proteins), variety, and availability.

    Once again, health and nutrition are influential factors – 47% would rather eat plant proteins like pulses, legumes and whole grains, just as 31% find meat alternatives too processed. Price is also a deterrent, with 47% believing they’re too expensive. On the other end of the spectrum, only 3% say they don’t want alternative proteins to replicate their conventional counterparts.

    “If alternative proteins can be made cheaper [and] people have easier access, [they] will become part of the menus of a la carte restaurants,” said Chomthongdi. “People who want to eat food that still tastes like meat can order alternative proteins or even mix alternative proteins with meat, which will have better results than eating meat alone.”

    Thais support tax cuts for alt-protein

    thailand vegan survey
    Courtesy: Madre Brava

    Madre Brava’s research further revealed that meat reduction is much more preferential than elimination altogether. Half of Thai consumers are likely to eat more whole foods or swap 50% of their meat intake with traditional plant proteins and meat alternatives, while 40% would switch half of their meat consumption to alt-protein (which can bring tremendous environmental benefits). In contrast, only 13% say they would completely stop eating meat.

    Finally, the survey measured attitudes towards 14 potential policies across five themes. This included regulation of alt-protein production (for major food companies) and consumption (requiring more supermarket/fast-food options, public procurement in schools, and mandating retailers to align with WHO guidelines), consumer awareness (mandatory eco-labelling, national guidelines on climate impact, public education on the harms of industrial meat, and school curriculums on meat and alternatives’ impact), taxation (increased tax on animal meat, reduced levies on alt-proteins), and investment (for alt-protein R&D, farmer transition, and startups and SMEs in the space).

    The latter garners strong support from Thai consumers, with 72% and 69% backing investment for farmer transition to new jobs and eco-friendly practices, respectively. A reduced tax on alt-proteins was also supported by 70% of respondents, while a higher surcharge on animal-derived meat was only chosen by 23%. In fact, an increased tax on conventional meat was the most opposed policy intervention, with 71% arguing against it.

    “If the government has a policy to seriously support the production of plant-based protein and alternative protein, both for domestic consumption and export, it would be able to correspond with the direction of both the domestic and export markets,” said Chomthongdi.

    “Thailand has food technology, and we are a top player in the world, especially when compared to our population and country size,” he added. “Therefore, if you want to develop further in any area, the existing potential should be considered, along with changes and needs at the international level as well.”

    The post 67% of Thai Consumers Want to Eat Less Meat and More Plant Proteins For Health appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • is virat kohli vegan
    5 Mins Read

    The Good Food Institute (GFI) India has conducted a first-of-its-kind survey on consumer awareness, adoption and purchase behaviour for vegan meat and dairy in India. Here are 12 key takeaways.

    Two months after publishing its first State of the Industry report for the Indian alt-protein market, GFI India has followed up with a survey that provides a glimpse into how consumers think about plant-based meat and dairy.

    The State of the Industry report revealed how vegan dairy reigned supreme, with alt-meat showing some promise. India’s international presence was also on the rise given the amount of export activity, while government support has been encouraging too.

    GFI India aimed to identify the profile of the Indian vegan consumer through a collaborative study with Kantar World Panel, looking at who was likely to regularly purchase alt-meat, dairy and eggs, as well as pay more for these products. It is this survey that the think tank is publishing in full now, covering 2,535 Indians aged 24-60 and earning over ₹50,000/$600 per month.

    Here are 12 key takeaways from the report:

    1) Awareness about plant-based meat and dairy is higher in certain quarters

    india plant based survey
    Courtesy: GFI India

    Nearly half of the Indians surveyed are aware of plant-based dairy, and 27.5% know about meat alternatives. Awareness about these products is highest in metro cities and among those earning between ₹100,000/$1,200 and ₹150,000/$1,800 per month. The demographic is similarly skewed for vegan dairy too.

    2) Social media drives consumer awareness

    For people who are familiar with plant-based alternatives at an “unaided level”, the internet is the biggest driver of awareness, with social media platforms and website ads making up 50% and 44% of the sources for vegan meat and dairy, respectively. Word of mouth is also strong, but print ads and store posters are the least convincing sources.

    3) Vegan product trials are low

    Despite the relatively high amount of awareness, there’s still some way to go when it comes to adoption. Of those who are actuated with vegan alternatives, 23% have tried milk analogues, while only 11% have given alt-meat a shot. But 82% of Indians who have bought plant-based milk in the last six months say they’ll consider buying it again, with a similarly high figure (72%) for vegan meat too.

    4) Trying one category paves the way for the rest

    The GFI-Kantar survey revealed that 40% of respondents who tried meat analogues purchased vegan dairy as well, with 10% doing so the other way round. “Among the plant-based meat, dairy and egg [categories], plant-based dairy is the strongest entry point into the consumer’s household,” the report read. “Once consumers try plant-based dairy, they experiment with other products within the plant-based category.”

    5) Purchase intent is high for both meat and dairy analogues

    gfi india
    Courtesy: GFI India

    Of the households familiar with plant-based dairy, 43% intend to buy a product from the category again, with higher-income groups (earning over ₹100,000/$1,200 per month) and younger people (aged 25-44) showing more promise here. In terms of meat, this figure stands at 33%, with 42% of non-vegetarians likely to meat alternatives again.

    6) Supermarkets rule e-commerce

    Despite the boom in online shopping, when it comes to food, supermarkets are king for Indians. 57% of households bought alt-meat products from supermarkets, compared to 26% purchasing them from e-commerce platforms. This was in even starker contrast for vegan dairy: 65% in supermarkets, 18% on e-commerce.

    7) Chicken is the name of the game

    All of the top nine alt-meat products tried by Indians centred on chicken. Chicken seekh kebabs have been sampled by 26% of Indians – the most tried meat analogue – followed by popcorn chicken (20%), and chicken samosas and biryani (17% each). Meanwhile, 72% of these consumers purchased animal-derived meat products too.

    vegan survey india
    Courtesy: GFI India

    8) Soy milk is the most common, but almond is catching up

    As the original (and cheapest) milk alternative, soy milk has been trialled by 80% of the respondents, with almond milk falling not behind at 55%. 39% of Indians have sipped oat milk or eaten tofu too. In terms of vegan cheese, 54% of respondents have tried it. Plus, 89% of alt-dairy consumers also buy conventional dairy items.

    9) Nutrition, health and social factors dictate alt-meat consumption

    Having a good amount of protein is the number one factor driving Indians towards plant-based meat, with nearly half (47%) citing it. Convenience (33%) and easy cooking and cleaning (30%) are similarly important. But the largest barrier deterring consumption of these products is that other family members aren’t keen on trying them, holding 33% of consumers back. For 24%, these products aren’t relevant.

    10) Protein, health and affordability key for vegan dairy adoption

    Protein content is most important to Indians (52%) when it comes to alt-dairy too, highlighting a gap in messaging and marketing around plant-based analogues. For 43%, the fact that they’re healthy is key. On the other hand, over a quarter of Indians (27%) find these products too expensive, while 25% say an exclusively e-commerce presence is a hurdle, reiterating Indians’ reluctance to buy groceries online.

    plant based milk india
    Courtesy: GFI India

    11) Health and nutrition remain paramount for Indians

    It is general consensus that for Indians, health is the biggest driver for vegan food consumption (over environmental or animal welfare reasons). This is reflected by GFI India’s poll, which shows that being healthy and nutritious is important for 64% and 60% of alt-meat consumers, and 66% and 58% of plant-based dairy users, respectively.

    12) Taste is a huge barrier for repeat purchases

    As in other countries, flavour carries a huge influence on Indians. Poor taste attributes (and high costs) deterred many from buying plant-based meat and dairy again, with texture and dryness also cited as reasons for alt-meat. Meanwhile, ‘naturalness’ and the addition of artificial flavours and preservatives are other reasons here. Finally, not being compatible with coffee and/or tea is another issue, exhibiting consumers’ need for more barista-friendly milk alternatives in India.

    “To encourage trial and repeat purchases, it is crucial for manufacturers to focus on the trifecta of taste, affordability and convenience,” says Rajyalakshmi G, markets and consumer insights advisor at GFI India. “Like any new category, initiatives, including sampling, online campaigns, social media engagement, and strategic retail displays, can contribute significantly to greater awareness and broader adoption. Our goal is to empower manufacturers and industry players with essential consumer insights that can drive the advancement of the sector in India.”

    The post What Do Indians Want From Vegan Food? New Survey Reveals Sector Challenges & Potential appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • vfc chicken
    4 Mins Read

    After a year of acquisitions and continued sales growth, VFC Foods has rebranded to the Vegan Food Group with the aim of becoming “a vegan Unilever”, as it plans further deals and expects sales to hit £25M in 2024.

    UK plant-based meat company VFC, which began as a challenger brand making vegan fried chicken in 2020, has changed its name to the Vegan Food Group (VFG) as it aims to accelerate its mission of becoming a global food leader.

    It comes after a year of remarkable growth for the brand, which included the rescue of Meatless Farm from administration as well as the acquisition of pie company Clive’s Purely Plants. Now, it’s setting on a journey to become “a vegan Unilever”, with co-founder Matthew Glover expected to take a more hands-on role as the firm’s chief mission officer.

    Doing well in a stagnating market

    vfc clive's
    Courtesy: VFC

    Launched in 2020 by Adam Lyons and Glover (who also co-founded Veganuary), VFC emerged as a plant-based fried chicken challenger with wacky, bold marketing. Three years in, the brand has witnessed strong sales that have allowed it to expand its portfolio of products and offerings, which has ultimately evolved into what is now VFG.

    In 2023, the group rescued fellow vegan meat maker Meatless Farm from the brink of bankruptcy, purchasing the latter in a £12M deal for its UK operations (VFC paid just a small portion of the sum, keeping the brand assets intact). This was followed by the acquisition of Clive’s Purely Plants in October, which positioned VFC as “a formidable player” in the market, according to CEO David Sparrow. “With three strong brands experiencing substantial growth, we are well-positioned to further penetrate the retail and foodservice sectors in the UK and Europe,” he said at the time.

    Highlighting VFC’s vast portfolio, he added: “What excites us the most is the diverse range of products we can offer consumers, from enticing meat alternatives to wholesome and delicious vegetable-based options, making us one of the most diversified players in the category.”

    Last year also saw VFC’s sales value grow exponentially by 199.3%, according to NielsenIQ data for the Grocer’s Top Products survey. Despite this, it represents a fraction of the overall UK meat-free market, which itself experienced a slide in a cost-of-living-hit market. Meat alternatives were among the worst-performing product categories in the country, with sales declining by £38.4m, and volumes down by 4.2%.

    Companies like Plant & Bean, LoveSeitan and VBites have collapsed, while Nestlé and Heck have withdrawn products from their meat-free offerings. “It’s clear that, whilst it will see continued growth and demand, the level of early capital and emerging brands has saturated the space,” Sparrow told Green Queen in September. “Consumer-led brands that stay true to their core values will weather the storm to create strong businesses.”

    ‘A vegan Unilever’

    vegan food group
    Courtesy: The Vegan Food Group

    With the rebrand, VFG wants to become a leader in the global food space, with Glover set to work more closely with the management team. “With consolidation required in the plant-based space, and early signs of a rebound, the Vegan Food Group is well positioned to capitalise on market conditions and supercharge growth in the UK and Europe,” he says.

    The food group has laid out a strategy echoing that of international food giants, focusing on consolidation with “streamlined operations, cost efficiencies, and a robust market presence”. “Imagine a ‘vegan Unilever’, but with the majority of future profits being donated to effective animal charities and diet change initiatives – that’s what we’re creating at the Vegan Food Group,” explains Glover.

    By incorporating multiple brands, VFG hopes to tap into collective strengths and optimise supply chains to bolster innovation and set new benchmarks. The brand, which now boasts 80 SKUs across 21,000 points of sale in the UK and the EU, now anticipates sales reaching £25M in 2024. And earlier this month, it released a new line of frozen ready meals (fried rice and curry), as well as chilled chicken sausages and mince made from pea protein.

    The new identity signals a “crucial milestone” in the company’s strategy, according to Sparrow. “We are already one of the most diversified players in the category with VFC, Meatless Farm and Clive’s under our umbrella, but it won’t stop there,” said the VFG chief. “We are actively reviewing strategic acquisitions to add to the group in 2024, building upon a successful 2023 trading year.”

    The post From VFC to VFG: UK Alt-Meat Maker Rebrands with Aim to Become ‘Vegan Unilever’ appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • future food quick bites
    6 Mins Read

    In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Oatly’s first new US products in five years, Emirates’ vegan push, and a massive amount of UK news coinciding with Veganuary.

    New products and launches

    For the first time in five years, Oatly has expanded its product portfolio in North America, with two new SKUs catering to specific consumer needs: Unsweetened and Super Basic. The former contains a proprietary oat blend with 0g of sugar, while the latter only has four ingredients (including citrus fibre upcycled from the juice industry).

    oatly super basic
    Courtesy: Oatly

    In more Oatly news, the oat milk giant has widened its US footprint via a distribution agreement with coffee chain The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf that will see the former’s Barista Edition be available at over 180 of the latter’s stores nationwide.

    Another brand growing its presence in the US is South Korea’s Unlimeat, which has opened an online D2C store for its meat alternatives.

    Speaking of Asian producers, Hong Kong-based Omni is debuting its Plant-Based Teriyaki Bao Buns in the freezers of Albertsons, Safeway, Pavilions, Vons, Acme Markets, Randalls, Tom Thumb, Jewel-Osco, Star Market, and Shaw’s in the US.

    In the pet food realm, PawCo Foods has unveiled two AI-powered vegan dog food products, with a first-of-its-kind shelf-stable plant-based meat meal, as well as a premium fresh offering with postbiotics and fermented protein.

    Germany’s national rail company Deutsche Bahn, meanwhile, is doubling down on its vegan focus with a noodle stir-fry featuring Happy Ocean Foods’ soy-based shrimp, available onboard its train nationwide.

    greggs vegan steak bake
    Courtesy: Greggs

    In the UK, bakery chain Greggs has relaunched its famous Vegan Steak Bake, two years after discontinuing the product due to unprecedented demand straining supply. It is available from January 4 for a “limited time only”.

    In London, Le Petit Beefbar has witnessed a sharp uptick in plant-based steak sales. The Chelsea steakhouse says its Redefine Meat steak frites dish has gone up from 1% of total weekly sales to 45%.

    Slovenian whole-cut vegan meat producer Juicy Marbles has expanded its UK presence with a long-term deal with Tesco, launching its soy protein steaks for £9 per two-pack in over 350 stores.

    French food tech startup La Vie has penned an exclusive agreement with Tesco as well, which will see its plant-based ham available on the retailer’s shelves in regular and smoked variants for £3 per 100g.

    In another Tesco exclusive, plant-based meat brand THIS has released a new vegan chicken breast offering, retailing at £3.50 for a pack of two. Additionally, it has launched a frozen beef mince SKU in Morrisons.

    British startup Greenwood Foods has released its Soak’d Oats bars in all 29 Costco stores in the UK, as well as locations in Sweden and Iceland, after celebrating its millionth sales four months post-launch.

    Tempeh startup Better Nature has jumped on the Veganuary bandwagon with a new Smoky Tempeh SKU (which is seasoned with smoked salt). It’s available at Asda, Tesco, Lidl, Whole Foods Market and Planet Organic.

    vegan news
    Courtesy: Better Nature

    UK snack giant Walkers has launched a limited-edition Unbelievable! Vegan range of crisps for Veganuary in Grilled Cheese Toastie, BBQ Pork Ribs and Flame Grilled Steak flavours. While many of its existing offerings happen to be vegan, this is the first time the producer is marketing its innovation as such.

    Also in the UK, plant-based ingredients manufacturer Marigold has introduced a wholegrain Popcorn Plus SKU featuring its Engevita nutritional yeast. It’s available at independent stores for 99p per 20g.

    Continuing with the UK’s Veganuary boom, vegan chicken marker VFC and recipe kit startup Grubby have collaborated to add three new recipes – Crispy Chicken Burger, Korean Fried Chicken and Chicken Katsu Curry – to the latter’s menu. The link-up will provide five new recipes this year.

    British vegan ready-to-eat brand Pollen + Grace has launched three new ready meals for Veganuary. The Rich Aubergine & Lentil Moussaka, Saag Aloo Potato Pie, and Thai Red Vegetable Curry retail from £4.95 to £5.50 per 400g and are available in supermarkets across the UK.

    Vegan egg and aquafaba brand OGGS has launched Mega Caramel Cupcakes in the UK too, updating its packaging with ‘Cruelty-Free Cakes’ after its research showed a consumer awareness gap around eggs and animal welfare.

    Another British sweet treat maker, Mummy Meegz has introduced Chickee Eggs, a plant-based chocolate SKU inspired by the Cadbury Mini Eggs. The new product comprises vegan milk chocolate eggs wrapped in a crunchy shell.

    emirates vegan
    Courtesy: Emirates

    Elsewhere, UAE flag carrier Emirates is expanding its vegan offerings (which number over 300) after a 40% year-on-year rise in vegan meal consumption in line with passenger volumes.

    And B2B gourmet food producer Classic Fine Foods has released the CFFALT Recipe Book, created by chefs and collaborators in seven markets. The book has a diverse range of vegan recipes and hopes to showcase the company’s commitment to sustainable gastronomy through its alt-protein platform, CFFALT.

    Policy, funding and facilities

    British oyster mushroom protein producer Myco has moved into a 20,000 sq ft site in Leeming Bar, North Yorkshire. The company, whose protein is called Hooba, aims to turn it into a vertical farming unit, and create nearly 70 new jobs.

    In Denmark, new food tech VC Kost Capital has announced the first close of its €25M target fund with the Export and Investment Fund of Denmark. The investment firm will look to pre-seed and seed B2B startups focusing on the future of food, having previously backed Äio, Nūmi and Nutrumami.

    In sadder news, Catalan B2B plant-based food producer RIP Foods has ceased operations, citing funding challenges, category scepticism and the giant power of the animal agriculture industry.

    baltimore mayor
    Courtesy: Sandra Hungate/LinkedIn

    Meanwhile, Baltimore has become the first US city to declare January as the official month of Veganuary, with mayor Brandon M Scott openly promoting plant-based diets for environmental, health, economic, and animal protection reasons.

    A new Japanese book, Future Outlook for Cellular Foods, looks into the challenges faced by the country’s cultivated meat industry, and how they can be overcome through tech and social initiatives.

    Awards and events

    After pledging to step up its plant-based focus, Prince William’s Earthshot Prize has seen vegan charity GenV nominate Brazilian investor platform Vegan Business in the Protect and Restore Nature category for 2024. The winners will be announced in November.

    A team of students from the National University of Singapore has won the top prize of $3,000 in ProVeg International’s APAC Food Innovation Challenge 2023 for its allergen-free vegan shrimp product, Keepin’ it Shrimple.

    Finally, VeggieWorld & New Protein China, which is usually a single trade fair for all things plant-based and alt-protein, has now decided to separate the lifestyle exhibition from the professional forum (respectively) into two events after “studying the current domestic and international” trends in the industry.

    The post Future Food Quick Bites: Bustling Britain, Super Basic Oat Milk & A Vegan Flag Carrier appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 4 Mins Read

    An interview with former TiNDLE Foods CEO Andre Menezes, who stepped down from the company in late December, about his biggest learnings from his rocketship journey.

    Just before the winter holidays, plant-based chicken startup TiNDLE Foods announced that co-founder Andre Menezes was stepping down as CEO, and co-founder and Executive Chairman Timo Recker would take over in his stead. Recker had previously held the position from July 2020 to May 2021. In a press statement, TiNDLE said that Recker’s extensive European market experience, specifically in Germany where TiNDLE is seeing significant growth, and with his former plant-based meat company LikeMeat.

    Menezes, a Brazilian native with over a decade of experience in the food industry and who previously worked with meat giant JBS, originally started out as COO and Co-Founder.

    Under Menezes’ tenure, TiNDLE grew from one meat alternative product to a complete range of patties, nuggets, tenders, wings and more, presence in over 10 global markets including significant launches in the UK, Germany and the US, retail launches at thousands of stores, dozens of foodservice parnerships and a plant-based dairy startup acquisition.

    “I am incredibly proud that in only two and a half years, our team grew the business from an early concept in Singapore to bringing our foods to some of the largest markets in the world, while establishing a healthy business model and strong financial position that will support further growth,” he said in a statement.

    As he begins a new chapter, we asked Menezes to reflect on his TiNDLE experience, what he is most proud of, what he wishes he’d done differently and what can plant-based brands do better.

    Q: Why did you decide to step down as CEO amid significant growth? 

    Andre Menezes: My decision to step down as CEO was made in conjunction with Timo and other shareholders, considering the future trajectory of TiNDLE Foods. Despite our significant growth and strong financial health, with Timo relocating to Germany—a market where he has considerable experience—we agreed he is better positioned to accelerate our growth even further while leveraging the great fundamentals we have built over the past years. With a solid foundation, a globally recognized brand, a lean cost structure, and a strong commercial pipeline, I am confident the company will continue to thrive.

    Q: What are you most proud of from your time at TiNDLE? 

    Andre Menezes: Reflecting on my tenure at TiNDLE Foods, I am immensely proud of our robust financial status, positive unit economics, and a burn rate that’s been greatly reduced. Our infrastructure is strong, we’ve become a globally respected tier 1 brand, and we’ve seen accelerating growth each quarter. Notably, our 2023 volumes more than doubled from the previous year with much leaner expenditures, providing us with a significant runway of over 7 years, which effectively allows us to become profitable. But beyond these figures, it’s the team we’ve built—talented, dedicated, and aligned with our mission—that truly fills me with pride. Their efforts have enabled us to introduce our products to major markets worldwide rapidly—a rarity for any food business. This journey, although short, has made a significant impact and set a sustainable path for the future.

    Q: Do you have any regrets? Can you share one thing you wish you’d done differently? 

    Andre Menezes: I view our past actions as learning opportunities, not regrets, and I avoid the trap of being a “hindsight genius.” I am proud that our team did the best we could at every step, considering what we knew and the context we were in. However, advising companies now, I’d recommend a more incremental growth approach. The market hasn’t evolved as quickly as expected, so setting more conservative growth expectations would likely lead to similar outcomes with fewer resources. Back in 2020/21 when we set our strategic plan, the fast-paced category growth and liquid capital markets demanded rapid transformation into market leaders. This scenario has since shifted to a marathon focusing on financial sustainability and profitability.

    Q: What are your biggest learnings from the journey? 

    Andre Menezes: My time at TiNDLE Foods taught me never to underestimate the difficulty of changing consumer behaviour on a societal level. Purchase decisions are complex, driven by emotional and habitual factors, not just logic. Furthermore on the business side, while ambitious goals are exciting and essential, a gradual and measured approach is key, especially in challenging markets when you are reliant on purchase decisions of hundreds of clients and millions of consumers. This approach ensures the efficient use of resources, while not losing sight of a big bold dream. These learnings have profoundly influenced my approach to business strategy and consumer psychology.

    Q: What can plant-based brands do better, given a challenging environment for the sector? 

    Andre Menezes: The plant-based sector has grown rapidly but now faces a critical point where it must evolve. Reassessing innovation in product development and avenues to accelerate consumer education is imperative. Our ability to capture consumer imagination with exciting, delicious products and to reinforce the public’s understanding of the category’s benefits is vital for the next phase of growth.

    Q: What’s next for you in 2024? 

    Andre Menezes: My immediate focus is on supporting Timo and the team during this transition, ensuring minimal disruption. Looking ahead, I’m excited to use my diverse professional experience to assist other companies, founders, and funds on their paths. Having worked across various sectors and continents, I bring a unique perspective to business challenges and opportunities. I aim to guide and support others toward efficient goal achievement, helping them avoid the pitfalls I’ve faced and contributing to their success in a rapidly evolving business landscape.

    The post Andre Menezes on Leaving TiNDLE, His Proudest Achievement & What Plant-Based Brands Can Do Better appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 4 Mins Read

    TiNDLE Foods, the food tech behind the hit plant-based chicken alternative, is making its retail debut in Switzerland. 

    TiNDLE Foods, the Singapore-headquartered global vegan meat brand, has made its way to Switzerland. Launching exclusively on the shelves of supermarket chain Coop, shoppers in the country will now be able to purchase the brand’s range of plant-based chicken products at 440 stores nationwide, as well as via the retailer’s online platform. 

    A number of the brand’s fan favourites will be found on shelves, including TiNDLE Burgers, Crispy Fillets, Nuggets, and Wings. The 100% vegan range is made using soy and wheat protein and packs 17 grams of protein and 8 grams of fibre per 100-gram serving. These will be sold for RRP 5.95 CHF, with the exception of Nuggets, which retail for 4.95 CHF. 

    When asked whether TiNDLE will also roll out in Swiss restaurants, the food tech told Green Queen that at the moment, they are remaining “focused on the retail category for now”. 

    The launch comes in time for Veganuary, the global movement that challenges participants to go vegan for the first month of the new year for animal welfare, sustainability, and health reasons. 

    As part of the Veganuary campaign, TiNDLE said that there are 2 discount promotions until the first half of the month (Burgers, Crispy Fillets, and Wings retail for 5.35 CHF and Nuggets are 4.45 CHF) and in the final week of January, there will be a 25% discount on the whole range. 

    tindle tenders
    Courtesy: TiNDLE Foods

    Vegan products are part of Coop’s sustainability plans

    The launch of TiNDLE Chicken is part of the retailer’s larger sustainability plans, including its goal to reduce its environmental footprint by 2026. As part of its strategy, the supermarket giant is introducing a number of new “sustainable product angles”—one of which is meat substitutes like TiNDLE. 

    “We are continually monitoring the market, along with the latest trends and plant-based products that are being developed. Not only are TiNDLE’s chicken products innovative, but they are in line with what consumers are looking for and are the ideal addition to our range of vegan products,” shared product purchasing manager for vegan and vegetarian alternatives at Coop, Martin Stutz. 

    The four products launched at over 400 stores nationwide and via the retailer’s online channel, Burgers, Crispy Fillets, Nuggets and Wings, are all convenient alternatives designed for consumers to prepare within minutes. 

    According to Coop, many of its shoppers are looking for grocery-ready meat alternatives, with 63% of Swiss consumers actively reducing meat consumption in its latest poll findings. Coop also saw its own meat substitute category grow by 350% over the last 3 years. A MACH Consumer study revealed that most Swiss consumers who purchase meat alternatives eat animal meat regularly.

    “Introducing TiNDLE to the Swiss market is an important step for us, as the country is a global leader when it comes to sustainability and preservation, with long-term goals to reduce carbon emissions,” commented TiNDLE Foods senior vice president of business development Marc Sohier. 

    vegan chicken nuggets
    Courtesy: TiNDLE Foods

    TiNDLE’s worldwide takeover

    Since 2022, TiNDLE has rapidly expanded its retail footprint, starting with its first-ever D2C product debut in Germany, where its products can be found at over 2,200 Edeka Group stores. It later launched in the UK with the supermarket chain Morrisons and Whole Foods, and most recently in the US. 

    In the US, TiNDLE’s chicken can be found in the freezers of Giant Eagle stores and in the online platform FreshDirect, as well as in various regional retailers sprawled across the country. Following the Swiss launch, TiNDLE says it is “eagerly awaiting feedback” from consumers. 

    TiNDLE vegan chicken was created by its parent company Next Gen Foods in 2020, and first made it to consumers through restaurants and foodservice channels. In 2023, the parent company rebranded to TiNDLE Foods and also acquired London-based plant-based dairy brand Mwah! in 2023 as part of the firm’s continued product category expansion. TiNDLE is one of the most well-capitalized plant-based meat brands globally; to date, it has raised over $130M.

    Shortly after, TiNDLE Foods launched a breakfast sausage for foodservice channels in the US. The company previously told Green Queen that it has plans to go forward with more products in 2024, from plant-based milks to gelatos. 

    Switzerland is home to one of Europe’s largest, most well-funded plant-based meat companies: backed by the likes of private equity fund L Catterton, Zurich-based Planted Foods AG has raised over $100M. Like TiNDLE, it has an extensive chicken product range. Board member Judith Wemmer told Swissinfo recently that the company’s main competitor is the meat industry, adding “the market for food products is immense and so there must be room for a multitude of different actors.”

    The post TiNDLE Chicken Makes Swiss Retail Launch at 440 Coop Stores appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 5 Mins Read

    Mush Foods, the Israeli startup innovating mycelium-blended alt-proteins, is rolling out a line of mushroom root blends in the US market. Called 50Cut, the product is aimed at improving the sustainability of meat and fish-based dishes in restaurants.

    Mush Foods, the startup behind a mycelium ingredient designed for ‘hybrid’ alternative meat products, is launching a line of mushroom root blends for US restaurants after debuting its ‘meat-plus’ range in Israel. The new range, dubbed 50Cut, is aimed at improving the sustainability, nutrition and flavour of dishes that contain ground beef, poultry and fish. 

    Unlike many other plant-based food techs, Mush Foods is offering a blended solution. That means its product is meant to reduce, rather than eliminate, meat from restaurant tables. The launch of 50Cut in the US comes shortly after the firm bagged $6.2 million in seed funding last year led by Israeli tech investment group Viola Ventures, which fuelled its restaurant debut in its home market.

    At the moment, Mush Foods has not announced specific foodservice partners or chefs where its product line will be used, but told Green Queen that the first US customer will be revealed “the the coming weeks” and that distribution will kick off “in the coming days”. 

    blended meat
    Courtesy: Dan Lev

    50Cut: Helping consumers cut down on meat

    The line is made using the company’s proprietary above-ground cultivation technique, which enables the rapid growth of culinary-grade mushroom roots on local farms in the US in just 8 days. These roots of a variety of mushrooms, including shiitake and king oyster mushrooms, are then used to create a number of pre-blended umami-flavoured products for chefs to incorporate into their dishes. It can replace 50% of the beef used in a burger patty, for example.

    In conversation with Green Queen, a spokesperson for Mush Foods told us that the product itself is 100% mushroom and mycelium-based, but has been designed for chefs to reduce the proportion of meat on plates. In a press release, the company said that nearly 1 in 4 US consumers say they are
    attempting to cut back on meat. The ground meat category is estimated at $600 billion ($94
    billion industry in the U.S. alone) while plant-based meat alternatives represent just 1.5% of the
    category.* Mush Foods is offering the market a flavor-first ingredient that gives chefs the
    culinary flexibility to meet evolving consumer needs.

    “We craft the mushroom root blends for chefs to mix with meat,” Mush Foods says. “We blend specific varieties of culinary-grade mushrooms to match the taste and texture of meat, chicken, and fish.”

    In an interview with Green Queen last year, co-founder and CEO Shalom Daniel added that the company’s product is a flavour enhancer too: “With Mush’s mycelium blends, the natural flavours of the meat truly come out,” notes Daniel. 

    blended meat
    Courtesy: Mush Foods

    In addition, Daniel said that the goal is to cut global meat consumption by half, thereby reducing a significant portion of the food system’s emissions and climate burden. “We don’t need the entire world to go vegan to have a positive impact on our food supply and environment” and that Mush Foods’ mycelium is a part of the solution because mushrooms are not resource-intensive and their product does not require “tapping additional crops.” 

    It might be especially appealing to the growing flexitarian population—people who are not vegan or vegetarian, but focus on a significant reduction of meat and dairy from their diets.

    Aside from sustainability benefits, Mush Foods says its new blended roots line is a good source of dietary fibre including beta-glucan, and is rich in nutrients such as potassium, iron and calcium. It is also a complete protein, containing all 9 essential amino acids. 

    Speaking about the product, Mush Foods culinary director AJ Schaller said she believes 50Cut is “poised to solve some of our most pressing environmental challenges in a stunningly simple and seamless way,” adding that it will “help reduce meat consumption while enhancing flavour, juiciness, and yields.”

    Sustainable and cheaper

    One of the main selling points of Mush Foods’ 50Cut solution for restaurants is its cost-efficiency. 

    Speaking with Green Queen, a spokesperson for Mush Foods says that much of the excitement about its mushroom root blends is that it “impacts the bottom line in a positive way.” 

    One key benefit? Local production. A Mush spokesperson confirmed that it is “growing the mushroom root with local farmers in the US, thus saving on expensive logistics and transport-related emissions.

    mycelium meat
    Courtesy: Mush Foods

    When asked about the specific pricing, the company did not provide exact numbers but stated that it would be below that of conventional meat. “Not only is there a positive outcome for the environment and for the consumer in terms of flavour, but the price per pound to our customers is less expensive than meat.” 

    “We already know that you can have a phenomenal product from an environmental standpoint but if the economics don’t work, it will not thrive. We believe this is a game changer for the industry,” Mush Foods added. 

    It’s one of the main reasons why Yael Alroy, partner at Viola Ventures, invested in Mush Foods’ recent seed funding round. “To be a category leader in this space, a company must provide great flavour, price parity, and nutritional value,” she commented, adding that Mush Foods meets her criteria on “all three”. 

    Other investors who joined the round include food tech incubator TKH, CPG and F&B investor Siddhi Capital, and VC accelerator Arc Impact Ventures.

    Daniel added: “We’ve found investors – including those who are strongly anti-meat – are committed to the welfare of the planet and animals and see the blended solution as an immediate and achievable means of reducing meat consumption.”

    The post Mush Foods Debuts ‘50Cut’ Mushroom Blends for US Foodservice Amidst $6.2M Seed Round appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.