vegconomist - the vegan business magazine

Dear Readers, Thank you for reading vegconomist regularly. We are taking an editorial break from 24.12 to 2.1.22, we will be back for you on 3.1 with new exciting content. We are very happy that so many professionals from all over the world use vegconomist. In 2021, we were able to increase our reach once again. We currently register 170,000 unique business visitors per month from 190 countries, plus almost 12,000 newletter subscriptions and over 27,000 LinkedIn followers. We offer an enormous pool of over 6,000 articles and interviews free of charge. A special thanks goes to the numerous companies that have booked advertising campaigns with vegconomist. They have practically financed the content. Many, many thanks for that! We hope that in 2022 there will again be many personal encounters at trade fairs, congresses and events. The vegconomist team wishes you and your loved ones happy holidays. Take care and stay healthy. Best regards Your vegconomist team ...

Find out more about the Plantbaser, and experience a product configuration live on Tuesday 25 January 2022 at 4PM (CET). Sign up with the form here! Vegconomist and Planteneers will show the configurator in detail together. Dr. Dorotea Pein and Florian Bark of Planteneers will demonstrate the simple handling, and explain the benefits for companies. After you register we’ll send additional instructions by mail. Plan about an hour for the webinar. Speakers Dr. Dorotea Pein Head of Product Management Planteneershttps://www.linkedin.com/in/drdoroteapein/ Florian Bark Product Manager Meat & Fish Alternatives Planteneers https://www.linkedin.com/in/florian-bark/   If you won’t be able to make the live webinar, no problem: The webinar is also available afterwards as an on-demand format via Vegconomist. Registration Form ...

The wonderful Elysabeth Alfano of the Plant-Based Business Hour is truly a force to be reckoned with in the vegan business space! What Elysabeth doesn’t know about vegan business isn’t worth knowing, and that’s why she is so respected and admired within our industry. “Never stop. Never, ever, ever stop. Nose to the grindstone. Eyes to the sky.” We caught up with friend to the team Elysabeth on her year in review. What were your personal highlights of 2021? 2021 felt like warped speed. Through my company Plant Powered Consulting, I worked with so many brands helping them grow their business and visibility.  It was nothing short of pure joy to see their brands take flight, or go to the next level if already established, and make impact.  That said, public speaking has always been a personal passion and I did a lot of public speaking in 2021 at business school, summits, conferences and more. A true highlight of 2021 was speaking at the United National Global Compact Leaders Summit in June. Which milestones can your company reflect upon throughout the last year? We started the year with the pressures of Covid, so it felt like a real triumph to take the Plantbased Business Hour on the road to Buhler in June and October and run the show live from their open houses.  Not only was it such much fun to be back out with people, but I realized how much The Plantbased Business Hour has grown as a show ...

Allen Zelden, as many of our readers will know, is an Australian expert in all things plant-based and sustainable with a focus on the APAC region. Founder of sustainability platform FutureVVworld, mentor and business advisor to many, as well as correspondent and friend to vegconomist. “I believe we all have a duty to lead by example and leave the world in a healthier and better place for our children and all future generations” We caught up with Allen to find out his highlights of the year and thoughts looking ahead to 2022. What were your personal highlights of 2021? For me, 2021 was truly a year for the record books! My greatest personal highlight was launching FUTUREVVORLD which is a digital platform completely dedicated to the growing movement of sustainability in fashion, footwear and design. With the Australian plant-based foods industry continuing to experience record growth, I also joined the Kilara Capital team as their Lead Advisor for Future Food to help fuel the ecosystems for those alternative protein companies seeking support at the “growth-stage” of their trajectory. In Australia, we’re currently seeing a lot of funding across venture capital, but as the alternative proteins space continues to scale, and we seek to make greater moves overseas, growth equity will inevitably play an essential role here.  Which milestones can your company reflect upon throughout the last year? Thanks to overwhelming support, having both the opportunity – and necessity – to relaunch the FUTUREVVORLD website was definitely a milestone for me. Typically, the best founders have often ...

Alt-meat brand Quorn launches new products to cater to Brits who plan to reduce their meat consumption in the new year. British company Quorn is adding five new mycoprotein-based meat alternatives to its range. The new products are Southern Fried Wings, Garlic and Herb Bites, Creamy Korma Bites, Jerk Mini Fillets, and Sweet Chilli Mini Fillets. Featuring a smokey taste and a chicken-like texture, the Wings are part of Quorn’s new Vegan Takeaway range. The Bites — balls of breadcrumb-coated mycoprotein with a filling in the centre — contain either a creamy garlic and herb sauce or a mild korma curry. The vegan Mini Fillets consist of mycoprotein marinated in either a jerk sauce or a sweet chilli sauce. They are said to be ideal for wraps, salads, and sandwiches. International expansion Though Quorn originated in the UK, it has now expanded to 14 countries worldwide. In August, the company announced ambitious plans to become “the king of alternative chicken globally“. Quorn is seeing particular success in the US, where it launched “ChiQin” wings and cutlets in October. Following the opening of a new Culinary Development Center in Dallas in September, the brand told vegconomist it was “paving the way for new exciting alternative chicken innovations”. “Quorn products are versatile, convenient and taste great thanks to mycoprotein, so you can choose to eat it everywhere, from at home with your family to restaurants,” the company said. “The new Culinary Development Center is intended to help us expand on these relationships ...

Plant genetics pioneer NuCicer has developed chickpeas with 75% higher protein content than conventional varieties. The new chickpeas are non-GMO and developed naturally using wild genetic diversity, producing a highly cost-effective protein with the power to disrupt the plant-based industry.  Looking to outcompete soy, wheat, and pea, NuCicer reports that its new ultra-high protein varieties will cut the cost of chickpea protein by almost half. Speaking with vegconomist, NuCicer co-Founder and CEO Kathryn Cook explains that the company uses “genomics-guided, speed breeding” techniques to optimize natural genetic diversity. This allows NuCicer to reduce a traditional 10-year breeding cycle down to as few as 24 months. NuCicer has spent over ten years compiling the world’s largest collection of wild crop progenitors with cultivated chickpea, and is now working to increase yield and production stability with increased heat and drought tolerance. The company is currently scaling operations with a plan for commercial production in 2023; “We are in conversations with partners who recognize the opportunity of new ingredients from our high-protein chickpeas,” Cook commented.  Chickpea protein future According to the company, chickpeas are already the third most widely grown grain legume, and make a sustainable, functional ingredient with a capacity for nitrogen fixation – meaning the crop enriches the soil with life-giving nitrogen. By exploring the extraordinary genetic potential of chickpeas, NuCicer’s innovations may provide a major opportunity for the crop to soon become a leader in the alt protein space. “As we develop crops for the future we must look holistically ...

The UK’s leading vegan cheese brand Violife has launched a campaign encouraging consumers to “Change Your Cheese, Change Our Planet”, with the campaign  megin on January 1st to coincide with Veganuary. The new multimedia campaign will show people swapping dairy cheese for Violife while eating out, cooking at home, and more. It will feature meals such as the ‘Change’ Burger, Nachos N’ Change, and the ‘Changecake’. The campaign has been launched following a study which revealed that Violife’s products have less than half the carbon footprint of dairy cheese. To improve its environmental impact even further, the brand has pledged to plant 10,000 trees from the beginning of January. Consumers will be able to record how many vegan meals they have eaten on the Violife website, and the company will plant one tree for every five meals listed. Violife in 2021 Violife has been around since the early 1990s, but its popularity has skyrocketed in recent years. In the past three months alone, the brand has launched vegan mozzarella slices, Tex Mex flavour grated cheese, camembert, and a festive cheese selection box. Violife has also expanded its US product range to include products such as vegan halloumi, while partnering with US pizza chain Papa Murphy’s to offer vegan pizzas across the country. “Violife wants to show consumers that what we eat can make a significant positive impact on our planet by making the simple change from dairy cheese. Yes, we are vegan, but you don’t have to be,” said Victoria ...

US company Actual Veggies produces plant-based burgers made with vegetables instead of processed ingredients. Now, the brand has created a sweet vegan breakfast burger, offering consumers a healthier way to start the day. The new Morning Burger is made with blueberries, banana, acai, cauliflower, pumpkin seeds, dates, and blue spirulina. It is free from nuts, gluten, preservatives, soy, and added oils and sugars, while also being certified kosher and non-GMO. The vegan breakfast burger will be sold frozen in packs of four. It can be served pan-fried, or blended up and added to a smoothie. Actual Veggies recently showcased the burger at Plant Based World Expo, an event that is not open to the public. The product has not yet been officially launched, and the company has not revealed when the burgers will be available to buy. Veggieburgers made from vegetables While most vegan burgers are made from processed ingredients such as isolated soy protein, Actual Veggies sets itself apart by using whole vegetables. The brand’s current range features four types of burger, each in a different colour — black, purple, orange, and green. The colours come from whole food ingredients such as black beans and beets. Actual Burgers says this selling point sets it apart from competitors like the Beyond Burger, and investors seem to agree — in August, the company secured $2.3 million from a range of high-profile investors, including the rapper Post Malone. “The growth we have seen over the past few months far exceeded our expectations ...

Growing plant-based protein is becoming an increasingly popular industry in Nebraska, one of America’s largest beef states, according to a recent report in The Independent.  Though beef and cattle ranching are Nebraska’s preeminent industries, more farmers are turning to growing beans, peas and lentils in response to soaring demand for healthy plant proteins. The fertile, well-irrigated soils of Nebraska provide perfect growing conditions for peas – the top protein of choice for many plant-based brands, including Beyond Meat.  While plant protein production is already established in large meat-producing states like Montana and North Dakota, Nebraska’s plant-based interests are particularly noteworthy. Proudly self-proclaimed the “Beef State”, Nebraska’s cattle population outnumbers people and beef production contributes approximately $12 billion to the state economy. Raising cattle is a deeply entrenched way of life, so the advent of plant-based meat alternatives has naturally met a largely negative response from area farmers and ranchers.  Yet, a growing number of organizations are specifically choosing Nebraska as a prime location to expand the plant-based protein industry.   Growing investments In March, Ingredion opened a state-of-the-art pea processing facility in South Sioux City, becoming the first North American company to produce pea protein isolates and starch. The company states the ingredients would be applicable in a wide number of food products including plant-based cheese, gelatin-free confectionery, and gluten-free baked goods. Leading pea protein supplier PURIS has also scaled up its Nebraska investments, increasing pea production there by 81% since 2019, with more growth expected. According to the Independent, an ...

Yeap upcycled yeast could be on the cusp of providing a sustainable, cost-effective, and scalable protein to seriously disrupt the plant-based industry. The brainchild of cultivated meat pioneer Didier Toubia – CEO of Aleph Farms – Israel-based Yeap leverages spent yeast after fermentation.  “A protein that can do it all; flavorful, clean, nutritious, sustainable, and last but not least, inexpensive”  As first reported by Food Navigator, Yeap’s technology develops protein from yeast that is a byproduct from other industries, including breweries. The process is further simplified by the fact that any yeast strain can be used by Yeap to create a functional concentrated protein.  The protein will be a cost-effective alternative for various food segments, including the alt dairy and alt meat markets currently dominated by less sustainable soy and pea proteins. The protein also boasts high emulsion properties for use as an egg or milk alternative.   Circular economy model Chairman and co-founder of Yeap Didier Toubia is reported to have developed the foundations of the company before starting Aleph Farms, the cultivated meat company also based in Israel. Aleph Farms recently partnered with actor and activist Leonardo DiCaprio, as well as signing deals with two of Asia’s largest food companies.  “Yeap is the world’s first company that produces protein from yeast, incorporating a circular economy model,” explains the Yeap team. “A protein that can do it all; flavorful, clean, nutritious, sustainable, and last but not least, inexpensive.”    ...