According to the US Department of Agriculture, 21,435 new food products are released every year onto the marketplace. Of course most are variations of existing products. However with the rise of CBD products and with the unstoppable rise of plant-based foods, we are also introduced to brand new, exciting categories of food on a daily basis. So here are the top five food trends and categories predicted to be leading the way in 2021.

According to the new market research report by Markets and Markets, the Pea Protein industry is projected to grow from $745 million in 2020 to $1,400 million by 2025. This is a staggering CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 13.5%. So what has led to this dramatic rise, and what can we expect from the pea protein market going forward?

The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly impacted our lives in a myriad of ways. And it’s likely that it will usher in vast changes in worldwide eating habits, as well as elevating new food trends. It is also likely to have an impact on meat consumption, as individuals opt for more sustainable alternatives and make more thoughtful purchasing decisions vis-à-vis the environment. We’re likely to see an increasing trend towards homemade food, with consumer interest focused more on hygiene and safety, as concerns about eating in restaurants remain at the forefront of people’s minds in our post COVID-19 world. Here we explore the ways food trends may be shifting in the wake of the pandemic.

The term vegan was coined only as recently as 1944, but since then we have increasingly ditched animal-based foods and turned towards plant-based alternatives. Today the American plant-based retail market is worth $5 billion, and the dairy alternative market is predicted to be worth $25.12 billion by 2026. So what’s led to the global rise of the vegan food market, and what trends can we expect to see in the future?

By 2024 it’s predicted that the global food industry could save $31 million if companies invest in blockchain technology to monitor their supply chains. The study, conducted by Juniper Research, argues that the adoption of blockchain will bring dramatic savings for retailers because it can provide a more accurate and efficient food recall process and streamline their overall supply chain. But what exactly is blockchain? And how can it help food retailers right now?

What is Blockchain Technology?

You’ve probably heard the word “blockchain” by now, possibly in reference to bitcoin and other crypto currencies, but you might not know what it really means. A blockchain is a digital ledger that is stored securely and records transactions simultaneously across all of the computers in a given network. Importantly, these records are extremely difficult to tamper with or change. So simply understand blockchain as a tamper-proof ledger, which can be used to verify the origin and authenticity of products. As the food industry continues to place an increased emphasis on supply chain transparency, the demand for the adoption of blockchain technology has increased, and will continue to increase.  

The dairy-alternative market is thriving. In Britain, for example, 25% of consumers are choosing plant based milks, with figures reaching 33% for the young adult market (16-24 year olds).  In the U.S., sales of plant-based milk grew by 6% over 2018, while plant-based yogurt sales spiked 39% percent, according to the the Plant Based Food Association. Almond milk, coconut milk, rice milk, oat milk and soy milk are the most popular types of plant based milks. But now there’s a new player on the block: chickpea milk.

The Taste

A main reason for the predicted growth of chickpea milk is its taste profile. Many plant-based proteins possess bitter flavors and when it comes to using them in non-dairy milks, the addition of sugar or artificial flavors are commonplace. By contrast the chickpea is neutral in flavor.

You may have heard of Veganuary, the global initiative which encourages people to ditch animal products in favor of a vegan diet, which was launched in 2014. More than 250,000 people signed up for Veganuary 2019 across 159 countries, up 49% on 2018. But Veganuary 2020 is set to be the biggest yet, with the organisation aiming for over 350,000 people to pledge to go meat-free. The charity is also targeting four new countries in 2020: Germany, the US, Chile and South Africa.

Veganuary is certainly a great way to begin the year on a healthy note. But just how successful will it be?

Record Breaking?

Norseland, the UK-based maker of Applewood cheese, believes that Veganuary 2020 is sure to be record breaking. "I would not be in the slightest bit surprised if the numbers for Veganuary 2020 reach, or even exceed, half a million people going vegan for the month," stated Lisa Harrison, Norseland's senior brand manager. "Obviously the surge in environmental awareness in 2019 will have a dramatic effect on the figures, but I believe that another key factor in the numbers of those abstaining from animal and dairy products will be the game-changing developments in improving the taste of vegan cheese”, she continued.

More than ever before technology is changing the way the food industry operates. In 2019 it served to create efficiencies, provided better products, and save consumers and businesses money. But looking forward, what food technology trends will emerge in 2020?

Online Food Delivery Market

Revenue in the online food delivery market amounted to US $107,438 million in 2019, and this will continue to increase in 2020. Restaurant delivery has grown 20% in the last five years. This market segment is rapidly developing and start-ups in this space will continue to experience growth. Deutsche Bank now estimates that the $24 billion online grocery market will surge to $120 billion by 2025.

In 2017 Amazon made a bold move by acquiring Whole Foods in a bid to take hold of the online grocery market. And 2020 will see investment from both Google and Uber as they develop their grocery platforms, and push grocery delivery as a part of their business models. 

As the food and beverage industry continues to explore and develop healthy and sustainable products, there are two innovations that are aiding the process: regenerative agriculture and blockchain technology. Regenerative agriculture is the focus on maintaining soil health and mineral content in a bid to grow healthier crops, thereby limiting the need for chemical fertilizers. And blockchain technology focuses on enabling greater traceability from the food’s source to the consumer’s plate. Here we outline the vast positive impacts of both of these technologies in terms of making the food industry healthier and more transparent.

There is no doubt that plant-based diets are on the rise across the United States, with millennials as the driving force behind this positive trend. There’s been a 600% increase in people identifying as vegans in the U.S in the last three years, and today there are 1.62 million vegans in the U.S. Perhaps more importantly, the 39% of Americans who aren’t vegan now actively chose to incorporate plant-based foods into their diets. A recent study commissioned by the Plant Based Foods Association found that sales of plant-based foods grew by an incredible 20% in the 52 weeks ending June 2018, reaching a total of $3.3 billion. The industry is undoubtedly brimming with business opportunities, as more consumers than ever turn towards a plant-based diet.

Why the Increase in Demand?

A big reason behind the increasing demand in plant-based foods is the vast health benefits that the diet provides. Two important recent endorsements from the scientific community have had a strong impact on demand. The American Heart Association now endorses a plant-based diet, explaining that it prevents and treats heart disease, strokes, obesity, high cholesterol, and type 2 diabetes. Likewise a ringing endorsement from leading medical journal, The Lancet, has also had an impact.  An independent panel of 40 scientists and health experts reviewed years of evidence and concluded the best diet as being “approximately half a plate of vegetables and fruits, the other half should consist primarily of whole grains, plant-protein sources and unsaturated plant-oils”.

The global nuts and nut meals market is predicted to experience a CAGR of 5.2% during the forecast period (2018-2023). Many top players are investing in nut meals due to the increasing popularity of paleo diets, so when a “new” nut enters the marketplace, people listen. The pili nut (pronounced Peel-ey) is that such nut. Taken from the Pili tree - an evergreen native to the volcanic soils of the Philippines and Northern Australia, the pili nut stands out for being particularly buttery. Vogue even described it as the “plant-based foie gras”. Its great taste and vast health benefits, make it the superfood to look out for.  

THE PILI’S NUTRITIONAL PROFILE

Perhaps the greatest strength of the pili nut is its nutritional profile. The nut is rich in magnesium (85 milligrams in one ounce serving), potassium, vitamin E and iron. For those on a ketogenic diet, pili nuts will have great appeal, since they possess the lowest carb count of all the nuts. The pili nut is also an incredible source of antioxidants, and contains oleic acid (monounsaturated fats), which are known to help decrease cholesterol. The nutritional benefits of the pili are the reason it’s been deemed a the world’s new ‘supernut’. Attention must also be paid to their taste; when raw they have a similar flavor to a toasted pumpkin seed.

Marine plastic pollution has become one of the world’s most pressing environmental problems. A number of food and beverage manufacturers are tackling the problem head on, by developing plastic-free alternatives to their packaging.

Consumer exhaustion with excess packaging has lead to plastic-free aisles in supermarkets and packaging-free stores.  Dutch supermarket chain Ekoplaza opened the world’s first plastic-free aisle in their Amsterdam store in 2018. This sent ripples through the food packaging industry, with environmental campaign groups calling for more supermarkets to take the same approach. Sian Sutherland, co-founder of ‘A Plastic Planet’, argues: “for decades shoppers have been sold the lie that we can't live without plastic in food and drink. A plastic-free aisle dispels all that". 

In March, German supermarket chain Aldi announced that they were trialling plastic-free packaging in a number of Scottish stores. Their aim is to be completely sustainable by 2025. This should mean no more plastic and all packaging will be recyclable, reusable or compostable. Aldi U.S. CEO Jason Hart explains: "ALDI has never offered single-use plastic shopping bags. And while we’re pleased that we’ve helped keep billions of plastic grocery bags out of landfills and oceans, we want to continue to do more. The commitments we’re making to reduce plastic packaging waste are an investment in our collective future that we are proud to make. In 2018, ALDI recycled more than 250,000 tons of materials, including paper, cardboard, plastic and metal. Through this recycling effort, ALDI avoided the greenhouse gas equivalent of 8,094,533 gallons of gasoline."

The coffee trade is responsible for mass deforestation and is a major contributor to climate change, so in August when American start up Atomo announced they had developed the world’s first synthetic “coffee”, the beverage industry got excited.

Thanks to a multi-million dollar seed investment, the public can expect their first sip of bean-less coffee as early as 2020. “The coffee industry is ripe for innovation and change”, Atomo co-founder and food scientist Jarret Stopforth said in a statement. “The acceptance of agriculture alternatives has been proven with meatless meats and dairy-free milks, we want to continue that movement in a category we feel passionate about, coffee.” 

HOW IS SYNTHETIC COFFEE MADE?

Unlike plant-based products in which existing food ingredients are used, Atomo’s coffee is ‘created’ in a lab. It is a molecular fluid, which includes quinic acid, dimethyl disulfide, niacin, 2-ethylphenol, and a handful of other ingredients.  

Imagine this: you put on your virtual reality headset and you find yourself in a complete virtual supermarket, where you can walk around, interact with produce and you buy these ‘virtual’ items that are delivered to your home one hour later. Sound good?  As the grocery landscape continues to evolve, traditional brick-and-mortar supermarkets are learning investment in physical stores may not be the most cost-effective approach. Today leading supermarkets and food and beverage retailers are exploring the potential and possibilities of virtual reality.

WALMART’S VR APPROACH

In August of 2018 Walmart filed a second patent for at home virtual reality shopping. They describe a system in which users wear a VR headset and sensory gloves, which provides them with an in-store experience from the comfort of their home. Orders that customers place through Walmart’s VR program would then be uploaded to their fulfillment centre where orders would be distributed by autonomous robots.

Naturally this type of shopping experience will appeal to busy people, or those who find it challenging to travel to their local store. But there also other more immediate benefits to virtual-reality enabled stores. Physical store space is still an important asset to retailers. When they’re designing and modifying their stores VR is a great way to test and develop the best use of space and design. Before any financial investment is made in terms of remodeling the physical store, retailers can instead leverage VR to digitally test their store variables, as well as designing stores from a consumer’s perspective. Customers can “walk” through VR stores and deliver feedback in terms of their enjoyment, mood etc. How is the décor? The ambience? The organization?

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is transforming the food industry in many ways. The technology opens new doors to innovation and new product development (NPD). It can also be used to power demand forecasting models and meet production requirements through the elimination of overstocking.

AI FOOD DEVELOPMENT

The new Brazilian start-up company, Fazenda Futuro, has developed a vegan burger using AI technology. The burger has the taste, smell and texture of a regular meat burger, but instead it’s made from chickpea protein and soy. The cutting-edge ‘Futuro’ burger also proudly boasts the same nutritional prowess of a regular beef burger. Similarly, NotCo, the plant-based food manufacturing company, is using AI technology to develop successful plant-based alternatives to animal based foods such as mayonnaise, cheese and yoghurt. Instead their innovative products are made from garbanzo beans.

Food and beverage businesses that can leverage AI in their operations to develop and devise plant-based products (and substitutes) are likely to find success.  These AI processes include the analysis of the specifics of flavor, aroma, texture and nutritional content when developing meat alternatives. But the power of AI doesn’t end there.

Other startups such as Iron Ox have developed entire growing systems based around AI robotics. Their processes are aimed at reducing labor costs and minimizing crop loss due to factors such as climate change. Advents such as drone pollinators are also being utilized to increase efficiency in farms and greenhouses. This means the delicious organic produce we see in supermarkets is increasingly arriving via an AI helping hand.

Scientists continue to enforce the idea that a drastic cut in world-wide meat consumption is needed. In January 2019 the Lancet medical journal published a study that called for dramatic changes to food production and the human diet, in order to avoid “catastrophic damage to the planet”. A further study, published in October 2018 in the journal Nature, estimated that meat consumption must be reduced by 90% to avoid unsustainable global warming, water shortages and deforestation. So how can we best respond to this cry for help? One response is moving the planet towards flexitarianism; a diet consisting of largely plant-based food with occasional meat additions.

The global food system is certainly damaging our planet. And when it comes to tackling the environmental impact of meat consumption, scientists endorse the flexitarian diet: "We can eat a range of healthy diets but what they all have in common, according to the latest scientific evidence, is that they are all relatively plant based," said lead author Dr Marco Springmann from the University of Oxford. "You can go from a diet that has small amounts of animal products, some might call it a Mediterranean based diet, we call it a flexitarian diet, over to a pescatarian, vegetarian or vegan diet - we tried to stay with the most conservative one of these which in our view is the flexitarian one, but even this has only one serving of red meat per week."

If the world moved to become more flexitarian, greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture would be reduced by more than half. In fact research analysis by Oxford University scientist Joseph Poore shows that if every family in the United Kingdom swapped a red meat meal to a plant-based meal just once a week, the environmental impact would be equivalent to taking 16 million cars off the road. 

Many restaurants use forms of automation in a bid to increase efficiency, save money, and improve customer service. And as new technologies begin to emerge, with opportunities such as self-ordering kiosks, mobile apps, and other advanced tools, the reliance on automation is likely to increase. If saving money, streamlining your restaurant operations and staying at the forefront of technological trends are your goals, then read keep reading:

1.    Mobile Apps

The great benefit of mobile apps is that they increase customer engagement and also the likelihood of customers returning. Domino’s Pizza and Taco Bell have invested heavily in their mobile apps – which are a means for customers to place orders and pay with no fuss. Customer’s enjoy the convenience of ordering off their phone. So much so that digital restaurant orders have grown 23% annually since 2013, and are expected to triple in volume by 2020.

2.    Self-ordering kiosks

Another way to automate your restaurant operations is by investing in self-ordering kiosks. Your labor costs will be significantly reduced, order speed will be increased, and fewer mistakes will be made. Most prominently, McDonalds started rolling out self-ordering kiosks at its US locations in 2015, and the chain hasn't looked back since. By 2020, most of its 14,000 locations will have kiosks installed. BTIG analyst Peter Saleh writes that “McDonald's shift to kiosks and mobile ordering could help the chain win back nearly $2.7 billion in lost sales”. When it comes to self-ordering, research shows that consumers enjoy the convenience, the efficiency, and the accuracy. Research by Retail Wire found that  26% of people under 34 want to be able to pay for food and drinks using mobile devices or at self-service kiosks.

THE FUNCTIONAL BEVERAGE BOOM

The functional beverage market is forecasted to reach $208.13 billion by 2024. Global functional beverage consumption is driven by the consumer’s inclination toward non-alcoholic beverages. Low sugar, plant-based, functional beverages such as Kombucha, continue to boom and are preferred over fruit juices and carbonated drinks. The Kombucha market alone increased by nearly 41% to $534 million in 2017, and is expected to be worth $1.8 billion by 2020.

A RISE IN DEMAND

New ingredients such as mushrooms, cannabis MCT oil, and pre/probiotics have boosted the creation of these innovative “functional” beverages. And manufacturers are embracing innovation in a bid to gain a position in the market. Functional beverages assist in enhancing bodily health, such as improving the immune system, heart rate, digestive health, and weight management. As Mordor Intelligence found: “consumers are developing an affinity for functional beverages which offer enhanced convenience, thereby providing suitable, convenient, and healthy alternative to soft drinks” (FUNCTIONAL BEVERAGE MARKET - GROWTH, TRENDS, AND FORECAST (2019 - 2024). Growing demand from the millennial generation, and their increased focus on wellness awareness, coupled with increasingly busy lifestyles, have also led to an increase in demand.

With sustainability at the forefront of the food and beverage industry’s agenda, it’s no surprise that meat products are being replaced by plant-based alternatives. Earlier this year the California-based ‘Beyond Meat’ became the first ‘vegan IPO’ when they floated their shares on the Nasdaq stock exchange. But there has also been an even greater recent innovation with the advent of 3D printed “meat”.  

Startups, ‘Redefine Meat’, and  ‘Novameat’ have developed 3D printing technology to create healthy and sustainable meat-free products, which recreate the taste, texture and cooking properties of real meat. Vegan ingredients such as rice, peas and seaweed, are turned into a food paste that is then 3D-printed to form a raw, steak-like substance. 

BlueNalu of San Diego, California, is a leading force in the business of cellular agriculture. But what is this pioneering trend? By now you’ve probably heard of cultured or ‘lab grown’ meat, but what about cultured seafood? Cellular aquaculture is the process by which living cells are taken from fish and grown, using culture media, to create seafood.  

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Seafood consumption has doubled over the last 50 years and continues to rise, and the current seafood industry will be challenged to meet this increasing global demand. More worringly, the planet’s seafood supply chain is constrained by a series of complex problems, which include illegal fishing, overfishing, ocean acidification, rising ocean temperatures, plastics and other environmental pollutants. These factors led BlueNalu to create a cell-based alternative that may form a solution to many of the world’s seafood challenges.