Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

How short of protein are the Chinese?

According to the China Statistical Yearbook 2021 released by the National Bureau of Statistics, the average annual consumption of eggs in China is 12.8kg, which falls short of the standard of one egg per day, while the per capita milk intake is only 35.6g per day. It is not as good as 1gam10 [1] in the Dietary guidelines for Chinese residents (2022).

There are many reasons why people do not eat enough egg milk, such as taste, price, allergies, eating habits. To change people's inherent perception of traditional proteins, the recent popularity of "alternative proteins" in the primary market may be a good option.

Why do you need alternative proteins? The efficiency of animal husbandry in producing protein is really not high. According to the United Nations Food Organization (FAO), animal husbandry occupies 77 per cent of the world's agricultural land but produces only 37 per cent of the protein. By contrast, farming takes up only 23% of agricultural land, but produces nearly twice as much protein as animal husbandry.

Since the 1960s, the global average annual demand for animal and plant protein has increased significantly. The United Nations predicts that the world's population will reach 9.8 billion by 2050.

The increase in population has brought a huge "protein gap". How to produce enough protein to feed these 10 billion people is a matter of concern to all countries, and alternative proteins have become widely expected.

Not only developed countries develop and promote alternative proteins--

There are also many cases in developing countries--

In China, the development of alternative protein industry is also very important.

On the one hand, food safety is related to people's livelihood. According to the research conducted by the Institute of Food and Nutrition Development of the Ministry of Agriculture and villages, the self-sufficiency rate of food protein in China is 74.6%. In order to better promote national food security, we should continue to develop high-quality protein food resources and improve the self-sufficiency rate of protein consumption [3].

On the other hand, achieving the dual-carbon goal also depends on alternative protein technology. Global livestock emit more than 7.1gt of carbon dioxide each year, accounting for 14.5 per cent of total greenhouse gas emissions, and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has found that the use of alternative proteins, especially laboratory-grown meat, helps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from meat farming [4].

In the past two years, China is gradually increasing policy support for alternative protein technology.

On November 9, 2021, in response to the CPPCC member's proposal, the Ministry of Rural Agriculture said that it would support project support, industrialized production and cutting-edge exploration of alternative protein-related industries, and allocated about 57 million yuan from the central government to support the research and development of new non-grain protein resources such as high-protein microalgae [5].

A month later, the National Agricultural and Rural Science and Technology Development Plan of the 14th five-year Plan also proposed to study the culture and manufacturing technology of nutritious foods such as cell culture meat, synthetic egg cream, functional recombinant protein and so on.

The alternative protein market is expected to reach $290 billion, or about 2.03 trillion yuan, by 2035, according to the Boston Consulting Group.

Who did trillions of opportunities give? First of all, we should be clear about the scope of alternative proteins.

Compared with meat protein such as meat, egg and milk, alternative protein can be divided into four categories according to the source of raw materials: plant protein, insect protein, microbial protein and cell protein [7]. These proteins vary in price, digestibility, mode of production and technological maturity--

Differences in different alternative proteins | data source: Tianfeng Securities [8] in addition to classifying according to the source, these four types of alternative proteins can also be re-divided into two categories according to whether the production of proteins uses synthetic biological techniques such as transgenic and genetic modification.

Plant substitute protein has been used for a long time. Human beings have been growing crops such as soybeans and peas for more than thousands of years, and their products are a common source of protein for both humans and livestock.

Asians have the habit of eating a plant-based diet, and tofu, soy milk and vegetarian chicken are already important sources of protein, but in Europe and the United States, plant-derived protein is only popular among a small number of vegetarians, so it is still among the alternative proteins.

In recent years, there are three hotspots in the research of plant alternative proteins.

One is to develop new natural plant proteins, such as Rubisco protein extracted from tomato leaves, which surpasses whey protein and soy protein in taste and nutrition, and the protein extracted from industrial hemp seeds can be used instead of eggs.

But the content of this kind of protein is not high in plants, so how to produce it on a large scale? This has spawned the second direction of plant alternative proteins-the use of synthetic biology to produce proteins.

Synthetic biology can use genetic means to increase the yield of target proteins and even allow plants to produce animal proteins.

Magi Richani, founder of Nobell Foods, an American biotechnology company, believes that cows essentially convert plant protein into animal protein, but cows are too inefficient and emit large amounts of greenhouse gases.

Nobell Foods uses transgenic technology to transform soybeans to synthesize animal casein in plants and make cheese after extraction. This mode of production is more efficient, lower cost and consumes less resources. The company received $7500 in round B financing in July 2021, and the product is expected to go public as soon as the end of 2022.

The third research and development direction of plant alternative protein is plant meat, but the technical threshold in this direction is not high. I will not repeat it in this article. Interested readers please move to the hard science and technology history article "if you don't eat, I don't eat, how can artificial food make money?" "for more information.

However, the Ministry of Rural Agriculture also pointed out that although plant alternative proteins have broad prospects, they are still in their infancy, and there are still some problems such as high production costs and lack of safety assessment. At present, the application of new plant protein is mainly animal feed, and safety assessment is carried out in accordance with the law to promote the development of the industry in an orderly manner.

Compared with animals and plants, microbial protein substitution is more efficient in protein production.

According to the article in the Chinese Journal of Food, microbial protein has excellent nutritional and functional properties, and its efficient manufacturing and large-scale application is an important way to achieve sustainable protein supply. In addition, the production of microbial protein is carried out in fermentors or other "bioreactors", which does not occupy arable land and consumes less water than animals and plants.

Similar to plant alternative proteins, microbial alternative proteins are also divided into two routes: not suitable for synthetic biological technology and the use of synthetic biological technology.

Among them, the number of the former is relatively small, represented by Nature's Fynd and microalgae technology. Through manual breeding, the two companies found suitable strains and algae species respectively to engage in the development of fungal protein cheese and microalgin food.

There are a larger number of companies engaged in the latter, including the transformation of fungi, Joywell and microalgae, which produce proteins by fermentation, and Changjin, Yuanyu and Demut, which produce proteins through photosynthesis.

Although Impossible Foods is a plant meat company, it is also conducting research on microbial alternative protein technology based on synthetic biology.

High price and strange taste are two important reasons why it is difficult for consumers to accept plant meat. Now, we are expected to use synthetic biology to solve the taste problem.

The DNA fragment of synthetic hemoglobin was extracted by Impossible Foods and inserted into yeast by genetic engineering technology to produce hemoglobin. According to Impossible Foods, plant meat with hemoglobin can also show a natural charred brown and "meat flavor" when baking.

But at this stage, whether plant meat or microbial fermented meat, its fiber structure and taste are still far from real meat, if you want to eat real meat, you may have to rely on cells to replace protein (cell culture meat).

Cell substitute protein former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill proposed in 1931: "We should not raise a whole chicken to eat chicken breast or wings, but should culture these tissues separately in a suitable medium."

This reason is very simple, animals' breathing, growth, activities and other behaviors all consume energy, which determines that the efficiency of animal protein production is not high. If we can reduce other life behaviors of animals and focus on the proliferation of muscle cells, we can greatly improve the efficiency of protein production.

Over the past 90 years, Churchill's imagination has been realized by cell replacement protein technology.

Cell substitute protein generally refers to cell cultured meat, that is, animal muscle tissue is cultured in vitro to obtain food materials directly. Cell culture meat uses the techniques of cell culture and tissue engineering, but generally does not involve the technology of synthetic biology.

Companies engaged in cell culture meat include Mosa Meat, Mirai Foods, Zhou Zifui and CellX for livestock meat, Eat Just, Future Meat Technologies for chicken, BlueNalu, Wildtype, Vinh Technology for seafood, and even Vow Food for trying to grow kangaroo meat, alpaca meat and extinct animal meat.

However, there are still two fatal defects in cell-cultured meat. One is the morphological problem, the muscle cultured in vitro is a mass of loose cells, and the other is the cost, the expensive bovine placental serum culture medium is used to produce cell-cultured meat, and the cost of producing the same weight protein is much higher than that of the other three alternative proteins, which also means that the technical route is the most difficult to commercialize.

For the first point, CellX, a domestic cell culture meat company, tries to transform cells into tissue and increase the taste through biological scaffolds and 3D bio-printing technology; as for the second point, Mosa Meat and Eat Just try to use plant ingredients instead of bovine placental serum to reduce the price of cell culture meat by 40 times compared with 2018 [10].

Insect substitute protein is an old acquaintance in science fiction. The protein blocks eaten by passengers in the last carriage of the Snow country Train are made of cockroaches. In reality, the source of insect protein also includes black water gadfly, yellow powder insect, cricket, silkworm pupa and so on.

However, insect protein has a special smell, which is difficult to cover during cooking, and because it contains ingredients such as chitin, it is currently mainly used in pet and aquatic feed.

At present, the companies engaged in the research and production of insect alternative proteins are Chapul Cricket Protein, Protix, Fengsheng Ecology, Amphiology and so on.

The concept of alternative protein is good, but not every company can seize the opportunity.

If you eat it, you may not be able to earn a huge market and advanced technology, thus fermenting optimism in the primary market.

According to the incomplete statistics of industry media Foodaily, the global investment in alternative protein reached 5 billion US dollars in 2021, an increase of nearly 60 per cent over the same period last year. Of the 10 largest financing events in the global food and beverage sector, 9 occurred in the field of alternative proteins [11].

But an industry fire and a company making money are two different things. To judge the quality of an alternative protein company, you have to answer the question of the business model:

Is the production cost low enough? Price is the main reason that prevents consumers from choosing alternative proteins. Affected by the price of raw materials, R & D expenses and marketing costs, the price of alternative protein is much higher than that of pure meat.

For Beyond Meat and Impossible Food, for example, artificial meatloaf costs between $12 and $16 per pound, while minced beef costs as little as $9 per pound.

As for cell-cultured meat, the price is even higher. Although the cost of cell-cultured meat has been falling by an order of magnitude every three years over the past decade, it is a question mark whether that rate can be maintained.

It has been reported that due to the difficulty of bioreactor research and development, the maintenance cost of large-scale production equipment and the cost of cell culture medium, "economical cell culture meat products" will be a pseudo-proposition in the next few decades [13].

Make fodder or give it to people? The use of alternative proteins determines the ceiling of the price.

Since the beginning of this year, the price of soybean meal has risen continuously due to geographical conflicts, which has reached a new high in nearly 10 years, but it has been passed on to the sales end, and the price of soybean meal purchased by feed factories has not reached 5000 yuan / ton (about 5 yuan / kg) [14]. Although the Ministry of Agriculture in Rural areas has listed six kinds of algae and processed products such as Spirulina platensis and Spirulina in the list of feed raw materials in our country, due to the limitation of production cost, most enterprises use these raw materials as feed additives, so it is difficult to form a "substitute" [15].

If it is used as an alternative protein for human use, it has a higher degree of freedom in price. 1688 platform information shows that the price of whey protein powder of MSG in the United States ranges from 75 yuan / kg to 105 yuan / kg. Some plant proteins and algae proteins have been substituted.

Beware of jam in manufacturing equipment

On September 12, 2022, the White House website released a briefing announcing that US President Joe Biden had formally signed an executive order to launch the National Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing Program to promote the "decoupling" of imports and exports of reagents, instruments and raw materials between China and the United States.

Some practitioners of synthetic biology believe that although China is strong in production and manufacturing, the total amount of products in the biological fermentation industry ranks first in the world. However, in terms of high-end fermentation equipment, people still rely on imported equipment, and people in the field of biotechnology in China are facing unprecedented challenges.

Yuan Longping and Norman solved the problem of carbon and water supply, but from being full to eating well, the pressure came to the protein side.

References:

[1] China Statistical Yearbook-2021 2021.10.9 www.stats.gov.cn/ tjsj / tjcbw / 202110 / t20211009_1822768.html

[2] World population projected to reach 9.8 billion in 2050, and 11.2 billion in 2100 2017.6.21 https://www.un.org/development/desa/en/news/population/world-population-prospects-2017.html

[3] experts talk about "Great Food View" | Xu Haiquan: current situation and thinking of Food Nutrition self-sufficiency rate in China 2022.5.24 www.xinhuanet.com/ food / 20220524 / b5fb66df0b1644238e5026eb30b767c5 / c.html

[4] Major cuts of greenhouse gas emissions from livestock within reach (Key facts and findings) https://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/197623/icode/

[5] letter on reply to proposal No. 5062 (Agriculture and Water Conservancy No.475) of the fourth session of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese people's political Consultative Conference 2021.11.9 www.moa.gov.cn/ govpublic / XZQYJ / 202111 / t20211109_6381724.htm

[6] National Agricultural and Rural Science and Technology Development Plan 2021.12.28 www.moa.gov.cn/ govpublic / KJJYS / 202112 / P020220106615353271383.pdf during the 14th five-year Plan

[7] Alternative proteins: The race for market share is on 2019.8.16 https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/agriculture/our-insights/alternative-proteins-the-race-for-market-share-is-on

[8] one plane with two wings, three-dimensional development to extract the pearl 2020.9.4 https://pdf.dfcfw.com/ pdf / H3_AP202009041407491305_1.pdf?1601215122000.pdf on the plant crown.

[9] Chinese Journal of Food: biological manufacture of microbial alternative protein: progress and Prospect 2022.7.21 https://www.cifst.org.cn/ a / news / development / 20220723/2503.html

[10] Insight of cell culture meat industry: demand, technology, industry chain, capital, investment opportunities, consumers and policies | FoodPlus depth re-reading 2022.3.3 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/ s / sb6cLFLuKOOL-NygUBPYUQ

[11] summing up the new trend of alternative protein in 2022, what other opportunities are there for the trillion track to pay attention to? 2022.4.25 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/ s/5iNKzURHk9rbVFveAX1hEQ

[12] if there is no plant meat in the eyes of the Chinese people, where is the future of Sunday and Sunday? 2022.5.11 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/ s/7hdTztJlVHfOVdwi5T5JXg

[13] in-depth research: certainty, uncertainty and major challenges in the trillion alternative protein market under the heat of the synthetic biology race track | FoodPlus Insight 2022.4.13 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/ s / hH2gMgcoYbvCGkZXyZK6mA

[14] Industry trends | Soybean meal prices hit a new high in the past decade. Industry insiders: feed may still have room to rise 2022.3.16 https://www.cls.cn/ detail / 960659.

[15] Xuneng biological alga feed additive transmits the concept of healthy ecology with science and technology in innovation-driven industrial development 2022.2.28 dzrb.dzng.com/ articleContent / 4695_987899.html

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: fruit Shell hard Technology (ID:guokr233), Yang Jingyi | author Li Tuo | Editor

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