Upcycling and Eliminating Food Waste: Closing the Loop
06 Dec 2022 | Kerry Health & Nutrition Institute
How can we transform our industry to ensure that we can produce enough food for current and future generations with our available resources? On our current pathway, we would need the resources of 3 – 4 planets to accommodate the growing global population by 2050. Over 30% of total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are attributable to the food system, and food waste is one of the greatest sources of inefficiency in this food system.
Food waste can be upcycled, reduced, or even eliminated entirely, but where in the supply chain do we start and how do we take action?
In this webinar, we will answer:
- Why is food waste such a critical issue to solve?
- Where in the supply chain we should begin, and what are the first steps to prioritize?
- How do we successfully upcycle or reduce a waste stream to create value? Learnings from an in-depth case study.
Hello and welcome to today's webinar titled Upcycling and Eliminating Food Waste, Closing the Loop by the KARY Health and Nutrition Institute.
My name is William Bradford Nichols, and I am the editor of Nutrition Insight.
Nutrition Insight is a world-leading B2B news and insights website published by CNS Media.
We are joined today by two experts, Juan Aguirano, Group head of sustainability and Technology ventures at Ky Group, and Dan Kurzrock, founder and CEO of Upcycled Foods.
In a short while, Juan and Dan will give presentations exploring how industry can transform food systems to meet growing population demands within our available resources.
On our current pathway, we would need the resources of 3 to 4 planets to accommodate the growing global population by 2050.
Over 30% of total greenhouse gas emissions are attributed to the food system, and food waste is one of the greatest sources of inefficiency in this system.
However, if the industry could transform all of our food loss and waste, we would have enough food to feed the number of undernourished people in the world today twice over.
Before we get started, I'd like to remind our listeners that they can submit any questions to our speakers through the Q&A engagement tool.
Any questions that we don't have time to respond to during today's session can be answered via email following the presentation.
The webinar will also be available on demand on nutritionInsight.com.
A link to view the on-demand webinar will be emailed to you after the presentation.
With that, let's begin today's webinar with Juan's presentation, followed by Dan's presentation before we go, before we round off with our Q&A session.
And with that, over to you, Juan.
Thanks, Will, and thanks for the introduction and I, I want to review some of these critical information and data you've shared with us.
Why is food waste such a critical issue to solve?
And it's, it's a critical issue because every day.
We have 800-900 million, if you round it, people that go to bed hungry.
At the same time, 1/3 of the food is lost or wasted.
Basically, it's never consumed.
And that has a huge value in terms of food security.
If we could prevent it.
It also has a huge economic value, it's $1 trillion.
So if we were able to reverse that trend on the food waste that happens.
We would have enough food to feed 2 billion people.
So remember the 900 million, that's 2x the amount of people that are undernourished who go hungry to bed every night.
So that is the challenge in front of us as an industry, it's a very complex problem to solve, this happens end to end from farm to fork.
But the time to solve the challenge is now.
Why , we talked about the magnitude of the economic challenge.
If food waste was a country, it would also be the 3rd largest emitter of greenhouse gasses after China and the US.
So, it's an economic challenge, it's an environmental challenge.
It's also a massive opportunity.
Because consumers associate food waste with sustainability, 78%.
And 44% of consumers are willing to pay extra for food and beverage products that help solve food waste.
So the demand is there for that, and we've seen in recent years that the number of launches associated with a food waste or upcycling claim is growing exponentially, and this has only accelerated post-COVID in 21 and 222.
And finally, last but not least, governments are starting to drive pressure to drive change, OK.
In Europe, for instance, the Commission is revising the rules on date marking.
Why is that?
Because up to 10% of the food waste generated annually in Europe is linked to date marking.
So, under the European Green Deal and the farm to fork and the new incentives that the European economy will be getting towards a more sustainable food system, food waste has a big role to play and food waste reduction, I should say, has a big role to play.
So what should we be focusing on to change our food system?
How do we move to action?
Let's understand the problem first.
Where does food waste come from in the supply chain?
If you look at the end to end supply chain, production losses happen.
Early in the food chain, at post-harvest, handling and storage, and at processing and packaging.
That is called called food loss.
And food loss is highest in emerging markets.
It's influenced by supply chain resilience, shelf life days, breakage of cold storage chain, etc.
Where does food waste happen?
It happens mostly in developed markets, and it happens at distribution and retail and consumer losses.
So the solutions that need to be addressed are different in different contexts, and that makes it more challenging.
If we take two categories.
Of processed food.
The two most significant categories are bakery and meat.
So 20% of meat is wasted.
And it is the largest category in value and total carbon emissions.
That is because the associated greenhouse gasses to the production of 1 kg of meat is the highest, the amount of water is the highest, and so if you can prevent food.
Waste in the meat category, it has a massive impact.
It also is the highest economic impact.
In bread, it's the largest volume of food wasted, OK, and it's up to 50% in some countries, 630 million slices every day.
It's massive.
And again, here you have a significant CO2 footprint associated to bread, waterproof footprint, land, cereal, and economic losses.
So where's the opportunity to improve?
There is a waste management hierarchy.
The first thing and most preferred action is to prevent.
Food loss and waste.
The second is to reduce it, then reuse it, recycle it, recover it, and dispose from the most preferred to the least preferred.
I will talk about prevention and reduction, and then we'll talk about reuse afterwards.
So Let's look at Reduce the average American consumer.
Wastes 10x more than a consumer in Southeast Asia, so as we said, there are regional disparities.
So, for instance, in this case, a simple solution, it would, could be by preventing food waste by adding extra shelf life days, and we'll talk about how we do that, OK.
But half of the consumer food waste could be prevented by Chef Li days.
In emerging markets, 60% of the food waste occurs early in the supply chain as we saw, before it reaches the retailer.
So many sources of this food loss can be directly addressed by preservation.
So let's look at the case study here.
So this is a case study where at the food service chain, there was a significant amount of food waste that was happening.
OK, and, and going to waste.
So a simple economical solution to reduce food waste is.
Doing clean label preservation, OK?
So you protect the meat, it has, you add extra shelf life and it gives the opportunity to consume the meat longer.
This is based on a clean label solution without adding chemical preservatives, so it doesn't affect the taste, it doesn't affect the nutritional impact, it keeps all the health and the benefits of good food.
But it increases the shelf life and it gives more time to the consumers to eat the food.
In this case, the impact was a 24% back of house waste reduction.
If you consider that 1 kg of meat, if it's beef, can be up to 60 kg of CO2 and 17,000 L of water, you can see that this increase of 25% helps to reduce massively.
The food waste and the associated CO2 or water losses.
So switching, you know, switching to better clean label or adding clean label preservation on, on the meat and the food that is consumed is a very cost effective way to reduce food waste and loss.
Now, if you're interested to learn what is the impact that you could have in your own manufacturing, in your own products by adding shelf life.
We in KAERI have created a food waste estimator, which is publicly available for everybody, and so whether you're a food manufacturer or a consumer that wants to learn more, you can play with this by inputting the amount of production that you have or consumption that you have.
Putting in, and, and then the calculator will tell you by adding shelf life or by changing your behaviors, what is the impact that you can have.
It's a, it's, it's an educational tool.
We want to raise awareness of the impact that day to day consumer behaviors could change by by enabling solutions that increase shelf life.
Obviously, this is, a lot of that in the end has to do with consumer behavior.
The industry can add shelf life to that, but the consumer has to agree.
That this is a solution and these are products that they want to consume.
So where's the opportunity to improve, sorry.
The, the opportunity to improve at consumer level is really by helping helping consumers understand the power of food waste reduction, helping consumers what they can do in day to day behaviors and understanding that extra shelf life is contributing to reducing the impact on food waste.
And on that, I would like to ask Dan to give us an example of upcycling.
Thank you so much, Juan, and hi, everybody.
Great to be with you here from, from California, and excited to share with you, you know, some insights about one of the most pressing.
Opportunities of our time to simultaneously address the climate crisis by reducing food waste, but also deploying nutrition to humanity by Finding food where it's already being produced and making sure that it is going to its highest and best use, feeding people.
You know, upcycling is, is perhaps a new term, as you'll find through my, my content here.
It's actually a pretty old and intuitive idea.
And it really comes down to this, To this concept of making sure that all the food that we're producing is feeding people.
And you would think that that's, that's already the way that things are working.
But as, as, as Juan very articulately, shared, you know, there's, there's a lot of waste that's happening in the waste and loss that's happening in the system for, you know, a variety of reasons.
And the, the upcycled product development world is really a, a, a great opportunity for food product developers to address.
Consumer demand in a way that is systemically reducing food waste.
And, you know, just creating really incredible products, you know, from a high level, you know, just to share the, the contrast and the models of what we're talking about here.
The, the way that our food system has largely progressed and industrialized is through a linear process, which, you know, we refer to in the sustainability world as the linear economy.
Which is really all about.
To take, make, waste, it's kind of what it, what it boils down to.
And what we're suggesting, you know, here is, again, it's not the circular economy is not a new idea.
What, what it's all about doing is reimagining the end of one supply chain is the beginning of another, which, when you think about it, is actually how the natural world operates.
In nature, there is no waste.
You know, you, if you take a walk through the forest, you'll see a, you know, a down tree acting as a nurse log, you know, for, for new life, for new growth.
All, you know, all, all nutrients are, you know, recycled back into the, back into the system.
And With our, our food economy, our modern food economy, there just is, is some, some help that is required through, through innovation, to, to make this happen in the most optimal way possible so that we can progress from that linear economy to that, that circular economy, give consumers, you know, that what, what, what they are asking for, and, you know, seize the opportunity also as a, as the business community to, you know, provide these, these solutions that authentically are making an impact.
Just by, by virtue of of of of of what they are.
So, there was a great study that came out last year by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation called the Great Food Redesign that I, I highly encourage people to check out.
And, you know, one of the key findings from it, you know, is it really it keyed in on this, this concept of sourcing.
And, you know, we spend a lot of time in the food world thinking about sourcing, sourcing organic, sourcing regenerative, sourcing fair trade, you know, all these really important qualifications for, you know, supply chain sourcing.
And, and better sourcing is, is really impactful.
But what the, the, the study is, is, is showing is that circularity, you know, bringing in Upcycled supply chains, bringing in, you know, sustainable packaging design, and, and so much more is actually creates a lot more holistic benefit that is, you know, both, measurable from , an impact standpoint, but also, financially, you know, produces benefit, you know, across the, across the value chain.
And upcycling, again, this is, it's a, it's a new, it's a new term in, in, in some respects, you know, that's really come into the mainstream as a, as a mega trend, if you will, in the last, in the last two years with the trending certification now coming out of the Upcycled Food Association in the US there's over a couple 100 members of that, of that organization, a lot of innovators operating in the space.
But I just wanna to ground us in the fact that this is not a, a new idea.
You know, for chefs, the idea of using all of a vegetable is, is, is very intuitive, you know, root to, root to stem or nose to tail, cooking.
Or if you look at the dairy industry, which is, of course, huge globally, and the, the main manufacturing byproduct of, of cheese, for example, is, is whey.
You know, decades ago, there was challenges using , you know, finding a good use for, for whey, and a lot of it actually went to, went to waste or found to be plenty, fall, fell by the wayside, right?
And then, you know, and nutrition, you know, the nutritional benefits of whey as a protein source.
A market was, was developed for it.
And in some cases, there's now actually companies that are producing whey, where cheese is the co-product.
So it's, you know, looking at taking where there was once one product by virtue of a process and, and actually discovering that there's two products by that.
This is very similar to what we're talking about with upcycling, but doing it in a very proactive way.
Across the food manufacturing landscape to find where food loss is happening and, and, and do this more proactively.
And it's not just from food processing, you know, there's also agricultural side streams that are an important part of this discussion, you know, pictured here in the upper right is cacao fruit being harvested.
Cacao is, of course, the source of the beans that go on to become chocolate.
But it's also a one, the beans are just one component of a really wonderful fruit that has a lot of other fabulous uses.
The grain from the brewing industry is another great example, and that's where my origin story in this world was.
Was really rooted where we discovered that the grain used to brew beer is really a nutritional powerhouse.
You know, the brewing process takes the sugars from the grain.
There's all kinds of protein and fiber and flavor and functionality that's left in the sidestream.
The breweries, you know, have historically sent primarily to, to lower uses, to, to animal feed or to land application or to landfill or in some parts of the world to Unfortunately, to incineration, you know, and now there's, there's just such an opportunity to put this to a, to a higher use.
Similar to cacao fruit, the coffee plant offers another really inspiring example of, of what can be done, you know, with, with coffee, we are, accustomed to drinking a brew made from the roasted beans, which are really just the pit of a, of a fruit, of a cherry, which you can see photographed here to the right.
And also the leaves of the coffee plants are a really valuable ingredient with a history of human consumption.
In, the countries of origin where coffee is harvested.
It's, it also has the benefits of being loaded with, with antioxidants, more antioxidants and green tea, actually, a lot of great, you know, flavor as , and it creates a social impact opportunity to create it for new products from these agricultural supply, , side streams because they Give farmers the opportunity to get more value out of their, their crop too.
So, for coffee, it's only harvested for about 1/3 of the year.
So the rest of the year, they can sustainably be harvesting coffee leaves as a, as a tea product, and that, that has, cascading benefits to the local economies, as, as.
And from, you know, large scale.
Veggie and, and fruit processing, there's, there's often much trim, which, you know, our, our, our grandmothers probably used to use to make vegetable stock, or maybe we still do that at home.
But there's concentrated volumes of these side streams that are currently going to lower use at large scale processors that are really just ripe opportunity for, for, you know, for, for recapture and, and, and better use.
So, upcycling is really, you know, the, the solution that I, you know, I like to be punny, as you can tell.
And it's, it's, it's, it, it makes dollars and cents.
You know, this is, there's actually a formal definition now for upcycled foods.
This was put forth by the Upcycled Food Association, which is an independent industry nonprofit.
And it's, it's about using ingredients that otherwise would have not gone to human consumption.
And, you know, putting them to their, to their highest and best use.
And really key is this last, you know, this last bit here about how upcycled ingredients inherently are designed to make a positive impact on the environment.
And so, in order to get upcycled certified, companies can't just be greenwashing business as usual here.
It's, it also includes, measurement of carbon footprint from doing the upcycling process as as ensuring the companies that are creating upcycled products.
Have their own manufacturers's food waste reduction plan in place to make sure that they're not actually creating waste by virtue of trying to reduce waste.
It's emerged as a huge market opportunity, you know, in the US, you know, leading retailers like Whole Foods and Kroger have consistently cited upcycled foods as, as a top trend.
And we're, we're starting to see this proliferate across, across the globe.
This is, you know, not always gonna be made as front of the pack claims for upcycled products.
But is often actually, you know, used as a reason for purchase, and there's some great data out there that I'm happy to share and, and follow up with any, any interested parties around the consumer interest in, in, in, in this space.
And, you know, how that's, you know, how that's playing a role in creating pull-through really for more of the supply to, to be used.
And we're, we're fortunate as a, as a movement to have the benefit of a lot of wonderful media, you know, coverage about this issue.
It's a really rare opportunity to, you know, that, that just really authentically, you know, checks the boxes of, you know, doing good and, and doing by doing good, you know, reducing food waste really makes sense for, for everyone across the, across the value chain.
Just a quick, quick case study on how I, how I come to this, , you know, to this movement and, you know, I've been a, a very active pioneer on the, on the front lines of it, for just about a decade now.
I got my start, as a, actually as a homebrewer when I was, at university, where, as I mentioned, I was making my, my own beer.
And that really opened the, you know, opened the, my eyes to What might be possible at a, at a commercial level to connect the dots between the brewing industry, which was our initial focus, and food companies who are increasingly looking for differentiated products that are supported by health claims and increasingly sustainability claims as.
And so we launched, you know, Regrained as a pilot venture in order to prove that there is a market for Brewer's grain as a food ingredient that it is not spent grain as the industry calls it, but it, that it's actually a super grain that's more nutritious than, than any other virgin cereal, you know, out there.
And this is the first product line of a portfolio of ingredients that we are developing that are all designed to close the loop, you know, at, at this nexus of, of sustainability, nutrition, flavor, and functionality.
You know, at a macro level, it it's about looking.
All proactively all across the globe to where there is food loss being generated, evaluating these materials, and developing functional value-added ingredients for Food developers to really put this into practice in the easiest way possible, you know, as, as powders, as, as, as, as, as protein crisps, as sourdough systems, and more.
You know, we're, we're trying to, support the middle of the food value chain with ingredient companies and manufacturers to help them accelerate the development of, of upcycled products in order to, to make that impact faster because this is a very urgent issue.
And, you know, I spoke a bit, a bit about much of this, this, this value chain, you know, already here.
We, in the, in the US alone, there's about 20 billion pounds of brewer's grain that's, that's generated.
You know, there was, there, there are some key innovations that need to happen in order to close the loop.
So we had a breakthrough collaborating with the USDA and actually have a patented technology that we developed in order to stabilize the high moisture, very volatile, waste stream, you know, from, from the brewing industry.
It's We've been making beer for virtually as long as we've been a, a civilization, you know, here.
It's, historians actually posit that humans stopped being nomadic once we discovered beer cause it was too heavy to, to carry around.
And we started cultivating the, you know, the land in order to produce more beer.
Of course, I'm somewhat facetiously oversimplifying here, but, it's, you know, it is, it is the case that our, you know, our, our development as a civilization actually, globally, you know, is, is rooted back in You know, the discovery of, of, of beer making.
So this is not a new waste stream.
And actually, back in the Middle Ages, bakers used to use it in, in Europe and, and, and bread.
But at a, at a commercial scale, this, this material, because it's such a high moisture content, it spoils very, very quickly.
And so instead, it goes to the path of least resistance instead of to the destination of, of, of highest use.
And so, we developed, you know, a new way to , really extend that shelf life of this product, you know, just, just like how old technologies like pickling and, and preserves are, are ways to seal the seasons, you know, our upcycling process is designed to make sure that, you know, this, this value is, is captured and actually food waste is prevented and then able to be, you know, reused in, in end applications, which has impacts, you know, the, Just to highlight water because I'm from California, where we've been in a persistent drought for at least a decade here.
You know, the, about 90% of the water footprint of the beer making process is actually in the agricultural supply chain of the barley itself.
It takes over 300 gallons of water.
So just to , turn this into more of a heuristic, for, for you to think about, you know, this is the equivalent of about a 2-hour shower for every six-pack of beer in terms of the water that's used in the, in, in the, you know, cultivation process and for, for that material.
So, you know, this is a way to, do more with, with less, truly.
And it's a, it's, it's a huge opportunity in the, in the food space, you know, for, for companies to, to seize this, seize this opportunity.
There's, you know, as far as product development and innovation, you know, this, Traditional food development processes can take 2 to 3 years to get a product to, to shelf.
And, you know, there's really an opportunity for faster-moving companies to get these products to market.
You know, retailers are looking for them now.
And, it's, you know, there's an, there's an urgency, of course, around the, the macro problem to, to dig into here.
So, there's a, you know, kind of a, a challenge to product developers to, to potentially break through those conventional , product development cycles and, and consider ways of more agile product development to figure out, you know, test and learn and, and, and get, get products to market faster.
Big opportunity to break down the silos and in corporations and have cross-functional collaboration.
In our work, we often create a task force, internally with a company across their sustainability teams, their product development teams, their marketing teams, and You know, ensure that there are as many great minds as possible, you know, working on, you know, bring, , on making this, on making this a reality.
Because retailers are ready, you know, as I shared before, this is, these, these are products that are actively being sought by, by retailers because the consumers are, are asking for them.
As far as cost, you know, this presents a, a near-term challenge potentially and a long-term opportunity, just like with any new idea, you know, there's certain economies of scale that needs to be reached before cost parity with conventional alternatives may be, may be reached.
But what is You know, really encouraging is that, you know, these upcycled ingredients are currently at somewhat of a, you know, a modest premium compared to conventional alternatives, more similar to organic compared to conventional.
And these are not astronomically more expensive ingredients and cost and use is actually quite low and manageable.
And if you think about analogs and other industries like the energy sector, for example, solar, you know, I think it's a good, a good one to point to.
Sunshine is free, food waste is, you know, free, right, to oversimplify, right?
But solar in the last decade has come down across 90% in the, in the, at least in the US.
And, and I, I believe that, that tracks across the globe as.
So there's Great opportunities as, as these scale to not only offer all the benefits that we've been talking about, but also offer potentially, you know, marginal improvements for, for food producers.
You know, and then just a couple other, you know, seeds of thought for folks to, to ruminate on, and we can get into this in, in discussion if there's, there's interest.
You know, there's this question of the hierarchy of, of marketing of upcycled solutions.
So what by that, is how do you communicate the value of what a product using upcycled ingredients is doing without yucking the yum of the end customer, right?
Do people really want to see their food waste reduction impacts marketed on the front of a package of the food products that they're buying to then consume, you know, in some, in some cases, yes.
But it's the kind of the devil's in the details of, of how that can be done and You know, generally, it's, while it's a trending reason for purchase, especially in higher-end markets like, like Whole Foods, it's absolutely a reason for loyalty, right?
So, if we win on taste and nutrition, And oh by the way, this is also a more sustainable product.
People will come back for more.
I think the packaging question is a really interesting one in this space.
You know, our consumer packaged goods industry globally is effectively in the future trash business, right?
Every food product that's wrapped in packaging, you know, while this is a technology that preserves shelf life, you know, in one respect, you know, conventional packaging is produced typically from fossil fuels, right, which, which carry impact.
And so, You know, food waste, reduction companies aren't necessarily packaging companies.
And it's something that we experienced firsthand, pioneering compostable packaging ourselves here in the US with a line of products that we, you know, that we created.
But it's, it's an important thing to consider, you know, and we're looking at circularity as a whole, it's not just about sourcing, right?
It's about, you know, it's about the whole, the whole system and packaging is a really, you know, important frontier of that, of that system.
And then, you know, another kind of seed of, of hopefully inspiration for any food manufacturers out there, you know, where might there be opportunities to bring circularity into your own processes?
You know, maybe there are current, you know, current products that are being produced where there's a, a side stream that's currently being managed through the path of least resistance, and there may be an opportunity to, to find a better path of, of highest value, right?
And that's, that, that's The direction that that we're really eager to see the, the industry as a whole, you know, move in as quickly as possible.
Because ultimately, it's, it's really, it's really good for, for everyone.
This is creates a win, win, win across the, across the value chain.
So just to, to review a few key takeaways, You know, first, You know, it's that the food waste can be, you know, food waste and loss can be reduced and prevented, you know, within, within supply chains.
You know, second is, you know, through, this is all, you know, unlocked really through innovation and, and bringing design thinking into, you know, product development, looking at, using the best ingredients for a product and, and considering, you know, those that Not only deliver flavor and nutrition, but also sustainability impact.
Third, you know, this is really important.
We don't need breakthroughs in technologies to do this at a commercial scale right now.
We have the tools that we need.
We simply need the, the will and the coordination to, to act cause, cause the market's ready and, and the opportunity is now.
This is all about You know, reducing waste and, and unlocking value.
And I hope that this, you know, this brief presentation was, you know, kickstart some, some good thinking amongst, amongst the audience, and I'm super eager to, to support, you know, anyone in their, pursuit of, of activating this on, on your side.
So, thank you.
A big thanks to both of our speakers for their insightful presentations.
This is William Bradford Nichols once again from Nutrition Insight, and I'll now host a Q&A session with our experts.
Some great questions have already been submitted, so let's get started.
Our first question is for Dan.
What advice would you give to teams trying to upcycle?
Not to overthink it.
Not to let, you know, being too worried about, to use an adage, right, that, you know, that perfection be, you know, in the way of, of progress.
There's a lot of low-hanging fruit, so to speak, in terms of upcycling.
It's, I think the, the opportunity is really to take the imperative that food product developers already have around creating New products to launch, but then connecting the dots between those and sustainability priorities.
So, if we think about scopes, you know, first looking internally to see if there's any side streams that may be available from existing manufacturing processes internally.
But, you know, the easiest thing to do is actually to, to source, you know, upcycled ingredients and to, you know, engage with, You know, the community of, of, of innovators in the space, you know, of, our, I know that our company would certainly be happy to, to help here.
This is what we're, what we're here to do.
So it's, it's about really connecting the dots around what already exists, I think, you know, again, between Existing innovation priorities, you know, maybe there's a desire to create products that are, have gut health claims and are lower in net carbs and thus higher in fiber.
And then what if you could do that at the same time while making a food waste reduction impact, right?
That's, that's the type of opportunity we're talking about here.
And it's, Yeah, it's right under our nose.
Alright, thank you, that's practical and actionable.
Next question I believe would be for one, what can you tell us about the taste impacts of upcycled products?
Yeah, that's a great question.
Uncycled products have to taste better, if possible, or at least as good as the incumbents.
And so it's not only replacing incumbents, it's also innovating new products and taste has to be there 100% of the time, it needs to be a fantastic sensory experience for the consumer, otherwise, it will not work.
So it does create some challenges, if you take spent grain in the example that Dan was giving, spent grain might not have the best of basic taste, so when, when you process that into an upcycled product, there are some taste challenges to, to address, but they are not, they are not, they might be complex, but they, they don't require invention in technologies.
This is using good science and good skills available in the industry.
To create great tasting products, but not to be underestimated, right?
Taking a shortcut and thinking that the consumer will consume the product because it is upcycled and it's good for the planet, but the taste experience is bad, we will try it once and never try it again.
So in our experience, making sure the taste is great is fantastic.
The second part to that, if, if we can then create ways to taste and add that back into the product, that is great, right?
So think of the Citrus industry or orange industry that creates beautiful, you know, juices and fruit purees and all kinds of other applications with the first press.
But then all the peels and the skins and the seeds are reusing to create beautiful orange or citrus flavors, natural ones that can be used in the industry again, right?
So that's a great example of a circular type of product, circular citrus or orange in this case, where everything is used and, and it is used for the right taste.
So I think that, that is an example of that.
We do that at Kry regularly, it's been done for a long time.
And we always look for opportunities to, to take all the parts of the fruit, OK, and use it to, to its best potential and ways to taste is a great opportunity.
Yeah, I think that's, I think that's really put and as as as we like to say it over here, a.
You know, people don't buy a product because it, you know, can't taste like a good idea, right?
So these, these upcycling is no doubt a good idea, but taste is king, right?
It's got, it's got to taste great, and there's no reason for that trade off to.
To have to exist, you know, great tasting, great nutrition, great sustainability.
Great products.
All right, thank you.
I think, excuse me, I think this next question, would also go to you, Dan.
What are the characteristics required to carry an upcycled logo on pack?
Yeah, anyone interested in the front of pack third party certification claim should go to upcycledfood.org.org, which is an industry nonprofit that is doing the certification program.
The , second version of the standard was just released, but at a, at a high level, there's a mini, there's a minimum percentage of upcycled ingredients, you know, verified upcycled ingredients that need to go into these products, just like with, you know, any other certification of, of organic or regenerative or, or others.
And that level is at 10% of a product's dry weight.
There's also a volume threshold, so maybe it's a sauce or something that's at a lower inclusion level for whatever reason.
But the aggregate volume is higher, you know, there's a pathway for that certification.
And then there's requirements around mapping the carbon footprint, you know, to consider holistic sustainability as, as I indicated earlier, and having a food waste reduction plan as.
So it's, You know, it's pretty, it's, it's pretty straightforward.
It is, you know, in its first couple of years of existing, right?
So there's a.
You know, certainly ways that it's gonna evolve over, over time, just like these other third-party certifications that are, that are out there.
And I really encourage folks to check out the Upcycled Food Association and the great resources they have available on their, on their website to, to dig in more to the, the certification process.
All right, thank you for that.
And this next question is probably best suited for Juan.
Can you give us any examples of upcycling food waste to address the future of protein?
Yeah, that's another great question.
Look, as, as we, we reached 8 billion, right, and, and people, and, and we will be 10 billion by 2050, this might look like only a 20% increase, but people will live much longer and diets are changing.
Everybody wants to have a high protein diet and they deserve so.
There's about 2 billion people that live on a high carb diet and, and would like to increase their protein intake.
So that increase, massive increase in demand for protein will require multiple sources, right?
We can't increase the protein from animal sources at this stage to the level of the population because we don't have enough planets, as we said, we would need 3 planets, so transitioning to plant-based is one option, but transition, food waste to protein is another massive option, which is not talked about enough.
So in waste, there is a lot of protein, we talked about whey in the past and dairy to being a source of protein and a massive source of protein now, Dan talked about spent grain, and one of the things with spent grain, it's full of protein, so you turn that, you can turn that into beverages or other sources of protein.
We've done a very nice collaboration with Dan's team to create a protein crisp, for instance, which is now commercial, but you can do many things there and then that's using, you know, different types of technologies as Dan explained, preservation and fermentation, etc.
All the 2000 years old technologies, but that you modernize with science, which brings me to the next source, it's precision fermentation.
Today with precision fermentation, you can take low value feedstocks.
Or low fat value substrates like mycelium, algae, etc.
And transfer and transform that through precision fermentation technology into very great sources of proteins and Ad might want to ask, Dan might want to add something to that.
Yeah, I think that, the only thing, oh, go ahead, sorry.
No, no, sorry, go ahead, Dan, I didn't mean to interrupt you.
No, I think, you know, I think Juan covered it, you know, quite , it's a, you know, where can we be in any of these new future food.
You know, future protein opportunities, where can we be looking at the inputs of those from, you know, upcycled sources.
As opposed to virgin sources, right?
So, making sure that, you know, every, we're getting the most out of everything that we're, that we're producing, just like, just like nature would.
And while we're, you know, really, you know, scientifically engineering in many ways, the, the future of how we're going to feed this, this planet with, with, innovations like precision fermentation, you know, I think it could be done in a, in a linear way or a circular way, right?
And, I just, You know, encourage the, the innovators out there to always be thinking of, of incorporating circularity into every aspect of every decision.
Unfortunately, that is all we have time for today.
I would like to thank today's speakers for sharing their insights and expertise, and a big thank you also to all our viewers around the world for joining us today.
Goodbye for now.
