NEWS: Money spent on developing plant-based meat alternatives results in far greater reductions in greenhouse gas emissions than if the same investment was made in any other eco-initiatives, said Boston Consulting Group (BCG).

In a report released by BCG this week, one of the world’s largest consultancy firms, it was shown that for every dollar spent on improving technologies and scaling up production of meat and dairy alternatives, the resulting reductions in GHGs were three times greater than investment in green cement technology, seven times greater than green buildings, and 11 times more than zero-emission cars.

The production of meat from the flesh of reared cows produces between six and 30 times more emissions than tofu, according to the Guardian. This means that replacing beef farming with food production based on growing plant crops like soy can have a proportionally high impact on GHG reduction.

As we discover in Surge’s upcoming Plant-based Meat: Forecasting the trend report, despite huge growth over the last several years, the future of investment in plant-based alternatives to meat and dairy faces several challenges including how to fulfil consumer expectations on taste and texture, and how to scale up production to achieve price parity with traditional products.

But with precision fermentation - one of the so-called ‘holy grails’ of plant-based production on the horizon that will allow plant-based food producers to create dairy and meat proteins - receiving boosts in investment over the last two years, signs are strong that the future is bright. In the UK alone, fermentation companies received £36 million in funding in 2021, compared to just £1.47 million the year before.

Globally, investment in fermented products and other alternative proteins, and cell-cultured meat, has rocketed from $1 billion in 2019 to $5 billion in 2021, BCG reported. Vegan-friendly alternatives to meat, eggs and dairy products currently make up just 2 per cent of the consumer market, but this figure is predicted to rise to 11 per cent by 2035 - almost equivalent to the global aviation sector’s GHG output. 

However, the BCG forecast is based on current trends, and improvements to existing technologies, scalability and regulatory support from governments are likely to accelerate that growth further.

“Widespread adoption of alternative proteins can play a critical role tackling climate change,” Malte Clausen, a partner at BCG, told the Guardian. “We call it the untapped climate opportunity – you’re getting more impact from your investment in alternative proteins than in any other sector of the economy.”

“There’s been a lot of investments into electric vehicles, wind turbines and solar panels, which is all great and helpful to reduce emissions, but we have not seen comparable investment yet [in alternative proteins], even though it’s rising rapidly,” he said. “If you really care about impact as an investor, this is an area that you definitely need to understand.”

This week’s BCG report is just the next in a long line of predictions telling us that traditional meat will soon reach peak consumption. An earlier forecast by BCG in 2021 said that consumers in Europe and the US would eat the most traditional meat in 2025, after which point consumption would decline. AT Kearney, another consultancy group, predicted that by 2040, most of the meat eaten would not come from animals.

The BCG report also comes just days after claims by the conservation organisation WWF that too much agricultural land was being used in the production of feed for animals, when it should be used to grow plants to feed humans directly.

As reported by the Vegconomist on Tuesday, WWF called the process of growing half the UK’s wheat - enough to produce more than ten billion loaves of bread - only to feed it to cows as “inherently inefficient”. While the WWF report doesn’t address a switch to plant-based alternatives, land currently used to grow grain for animal feed could conceivably be used to produce the ingredients for alternative protein production including peas, soy and other legumes.

As discussed in our upcoming trend forecast, production of the base ingredients is one of the factors that would hold back growth in the future, presenting an excellent opportunity for farmers looking to transition away from animal farming.

Andrew Gough is Media and Investigations Manager at Surge Media.

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