Tag: nutrition

Lab-grown cocoa? Celleste Bio backs plant cell culture to solve ‘chocolate supply crisis’

Celleste Bio co-founder and CTO Hanne Volpin with the brown stuff she hopes to revolutionize. Pic: Lawrence Harris

Israeli start-up Celleste Bio is building momentum to disrupt the chocolate supply chain… by growing cocoa in a lab.

Formed in July, the firm has already attracted the interest of Big Chocolate with Mondelēz International onboard with undisclosed seed funding.

Other backers include food-focused venture capitalist, Barrel Ventures, Israeli agricultural co-op Regba Group and agri-food and medical tech VC, Trendlines.

Celleste Bio’s USP utilizes cell culture to grow high quality cocoa without the plant waste and devastated rainforests and primate populations in west African countries such as Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana where around 60% of the world’s cocoa is sourced.

“Why grow something where you use less than 1% of the entire biomass of what you are growing?” Celleste Bio co-founder and chief technology officer Hanne Volpin told FoodNavigator-USA. “And why grow a food we really don’t need on increasingly sparse arable land? We could collectively decide never to grow it again or we can get creative and look at alternatives."

“We don't have to wait until we have no more chocolate bunnies to solve that problem. And it turns out companies like Mondelēz International are interested in this for reasons both biological and environmental.”

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UK FSA: EFSA’s safety concerns will not provoke CBD product removals

 

Image by Julia Teichmann from Pixabay

EFSA’s decision this week to stop the clock on 150 CBD (cannabidiol) Novel Food applications and publish a litany of ‘data gaps’ does not threaten thousands of onmarket CBD products in the UK, its Food Standards Agency (FSA) has told NutraIngredients.

The agency has itself held similar safety concerns for more than two years that have not been deemed significant enough to shift the safety needle against some 5,980 FSA-registered CBD offerings transitionally permitted on British brick and click shelves while it engages in its own assessments of around 900
industry-submitted safety dossiers.

“The information available does not provide sufficient evidence of a safety risk to determine that an immediate product removal is appropriate, based on the legal balance that must be made,” FSA Senior Communications Manager, Lisa Nelson, told NutraIngredients.

“So while we do not have evidence of harm relating to CBD products, there is also no evidence to show they are safe. The independent Committee on Toxicity has reviewed the existing CBD evidence and from that we have developed consumer advice on consuming CBD.”

That advice continues to be that healthy adults should consume a maximum of 70mg of CBD per day and vulnerable groups like pregnant and breastfeeding women and those on medications should not take it all.

Nelson added: “If we find credible evidence to say that CBD isolates or synthetic products in general, or specific products containing CBD, risk harm to the public, they will be removed from sale.”

The European Industrial Hemp Association (EIHA), which has submitted dossiers to the FSA representing more than 100 of its full-spectrum and isolate CBD-manufacturing members, supported EFSA’s work and publication.

“EFSA did this to help applicants improve their chances,” EIHA Managing Director, Lorenza Romanese, told us.

“So we support that. There are no surprises here really whether it is for isolates or full-spectrum CBD – the gaps have been known for a long time."

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Can DSM Firmenich merger deliver on its synergistic promise?

 

A slide from DSM Firmenich’s presentation next week…

 

DSM and Firmenich’s mooted 2023 ‘Merger of Equals’ will
create a nutrition, food ingredients and fragrances
behemoth with 277 years of collective business
experience and a combined annual revenue pushing
towards €12 billion (£10.2bn).

The deal rivals that of the 2021 €20bn+ (£17bn+) merger between International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF)
and DuPont’s Nutrition and Biosciences division.

The Dutch and Swiss firms have spoken much of the synergies they predict will save at least €175 million
(£149m), while not cutting too many of 28,000 jobs and keeping annual R&D spends higher than most
rivals at 9.3% of revenue – about €700m (£145m).

By comparison, Givaudan spends 8.4% of its revenues on R&D, IFF/DuPont 6.1% and Symrise 5.9%.
More here.

The gut-brain axis: Psychobiotic opportunity in 25 countries

Deep dive into probiotics and brain health. Published March 2022. 
The Gut-Brain Axis (GBX) is a research concept that has moved into the mainstream consciousness via mostly probiotic supplement makers that offer to alter the microbiota via probiotic supplementation which benefits brain health in some way. The scientific base is small but developing clinically, growing fast and boosted by the broader surge in microbiome study across a range of nutritional interventions that include probiotics.

Lumina reveals the evolution of ‘psychobiotics’ in 25 e-commerce markets from the brands winning the most loyal consumer engagement (and how), to the most innovative markets to business-ready scans of the e-tail environment, science, suppliers, regulations that shape the markets.


More here.

Saturated Fat: Nutritionists Press Authorities to Reconsider

As the nutrition science consensus shifts in favor of saturated fat after decades in the dietary sin bin over odious health links, dairy players say it’s time for full-fat segregation to end – especially as dairy under-consumption remains prevalent across the globe.

Armed with what they consider compelling dairy consumption statistics plus an ever-growing body of peer-reviewed research showing saturated fat is probably not – at least singularly – the agent of ailments like high cholesterol, heart disease and obesity it has been tagged with down the decades, the push to have full-fat dairy reinstated in national dietary guidelines is well and truly on.

‘Satfat’-friendly data is being presented to the committees that inform such guidelines while multi-channel dairy education campaigns aimed at consumers, regulators and the broader food industry are amplifying the full-fat dairy message and its potential to elevate across-the-board dairy consumption.

More here.