Growing crops to feed farm animals is vastly inefficient, driving up the price of grains and legumes, and entrenching global poverty.  The challenge to produce enough food for 9 billion people by 2050, requires a more efficient system and less food waste.

The Good Food Institute works with scientists, investors, and entrepreneurs to discover improved methods and use all the tools of science to uncover new ways of producing healthy and nutritious food. GFI, as it is known, has placed a focus on clean meat and plant-based alternatives to animal products—foods that are more delicious, safer to eat, and better for the planet than traditional production methods.

One of the recipients of GFI's Competitive Research Grant Program is Professor Mario Martinez and his team at the University of Guelph.  Their two year focus will be on the study of "plant-based meat" that will give meat lovers the textures they savour in beef, chicken or fish while retaining the human and environmental health benefits associated with eating plants.