What will the future bring? – Changing innovation rules

“Tasty” and “affordable” are the basic consumer requirements when it comes to buying food products. Recently shoppers have also started to focus on “healthy”, and “sustainable” has become important too. According to the results of a European Union survey from 2018, 42% of the average EU citizen’s ecological footprint comes from eating, so the EU set the goal of reducing this. One of the prices to pay for this is eating more plant-based food.

It is a very important fact that it isn’t transportation or packaging that make up for the bulk of the ecological footprint of food products, but the size of the agricultural land used in production, and its impact on soil, water, and the development of biodiversity. However, even if member states wish to reach the climate goals, many people are living from livestock farming or related activities in the EU, whose interests would suffer by going more plant-based in food production.

Legislation and answers given by innovation

Because of this, it can’t be told at the moment whether the new rules will be mandatory or just recommended, but many new laws can be expected. There will be stricter animal welfare requirements, and a few years from now a law will stipulate that food companies must use standardised labels, informing consumers about the product’s nutrient content, sustainability, and animal welfare characteristics. Green communication is also going to change: in order to avoid greenwashing, each green claim will have to be based on transparent calculations. It is likely that consumers will have to change their mindsets too, so that they can view so-called “hybrid products” positively in the future. //