The Impossible burger Photo: Flickr / Dale Cruse
The story around alternative proteins is that they are now "a part of life."
And the talk around them has "matured."
That's a comment from KPMG's Global head of agribusiness Ian Proudfoot who released his firm's 2021 Agri Business Agenda at the National Fieldays.
Alternative proteins are no longer outliers, things only vegans or vegetarians talk about, in fact he says they've surprisingly even dropped off the radar in terms of being a hot subject in the agri agenda, slumping from eighth to18th on the hot topic stake.
And this report is quite a tome, collating the thoughts and opinions of 172 agri-business leaders and others on a huge range of topics.
Proudfoot says alternative proteins are any food that replaces what has traditionally been part of people's diets. He says meat and milk could be replaced with anything from a plant, fungi, algae, maybe insects, or even lab produced proteins.
When they were first gaining currency a couple or three years ago they were probably considered a threat to conventional farming but Proudfoot says that's no longer the case.
"They're here, they're a competitor, address them like any other competitor, what are their pros what are their cons. What's our story that responds. That seems to be the response that people are now looking to take ... a more appropriate response to these products."
He says consumers these days want choice, and they should be given all the options and alternative proteins can be part of the picture, they're not an overwhelming threat.
Part of the story which he believes could be told more loudly is around the benefits of natural protein when it comes to nutritional density and the complex way natural proteins interact in someone's body.
"You can put these nutrients into some of the novel products but at the moment they're not as absorbable as a natural protein."
Seventy percent of Europeans consider themselves to be flexitarian Proudfoot says, which means eating less red meat, eating less cheese and drinking less milk.
He says his family would be in a similar camp these days when two years ago he wouldn't have even known what a vegetarian cookbook looked like.
Proudfoot says New Zealand producers can meet the challenges, but where choices are being made for "planetary health", New Zealand needs to make sure its story stacks up.
"What that means is we've got to get our footprint better. To accelerate the sustainability agenda, our de-carbonisation, our improvement of our impact on water, thinking better about how we work and use people, how we our treat animals. All of that agenda, and it's a broad agenda, but it does need to be addressed," he says.
The managing director of the Hawke's Bay-based meat company First Light Gerard Hickey and managing director of Waikato based Greenlea Meats Tony Egan both say the discussion has calmed down around alternative proteins.
Egan says when the first round of "hype" came through several years ago processors were worried but it's being seen in a broader context these days and "they're not quite what they're made out to be".
But Egan and Hickey both acknowledge they need to be ready for the competition, it's an emerging trend, but it's not a bad thing, it offers choice.
"We're doing the best we can to perfect what we have which is natural protein. We're open to alternative protein and in fact I've been to a conference in San Francisco to study it and meet people in that part of the industry.
"It's a definite threat in the longer term, but it's a big market out there and we can all play our part," Egan says.
For Hickey it's a case of telling the meat story better.
"Yes alternative protein is here, it's going to occupy a certain part of the market. We need to do a better marketing job of the product we're producing. Tell a better story and focus on those consumers who want natural product."
Egan says global beef sales are continuing to rise but he concludes that alternative proteins are something to understand and get alongside.
They're a valid part of anyone's diet, citing himself as an example of eating two vegetarian meals a week. He wants choice, it's a balanced approach to life that's important for him and he respects that in others too.
For the dairy giant Fonterra it's all about complimentary nutrition.
Head of Strategy and Innovation Mark Piper says it's an "and" story.
"It's been part of our activity for the past couple of years. There's quite a high level of interest in understanding what it (alternative protein) is. How can plant and dairy make an ever better product."
Piper says both plant and animal proteins have different functionality strengths.
He says Fonterra is also looking at fermentation produced technologies (microbes cause chemical changes in food) off shore.
"Imagine a future where New Zealand has a strong animal agricultural business as it does today, alongside it has a strong plant based and fermentation produced (product), so they're complimentary to each other and you increase the whole value, they're not at the expense of each other," Piper says.
A couple of years ago Fonterra became more active in the fermentation space, investing to a very small degree (declining a value for commercial reasons) in Motif Ingredients, a Boston-based food ingredients company that develops and commercialises bio-engeineered animal and food ingredients.
Asked about the risk of heading once again away from core business he reiterated "it's very much an 'and', not an 'or' story."
