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Brazilian food tech startups tackle climate impact

As record temperatures hit the South American agrifood leader, startups focus on novel ideas and technologies to drive sustainable change.

Temperatures in Brazil were the hottest on record in July, August, September and October 2023, with November having the potential to “rewrite climate history”, the Metsul said. Brazilian startups, incubator programmes and investors are emerging and collaborating to address climate change by providing sustainable solutions for the country’s agrifood landscape.

Championing startups

In 2022, Brazilian agrifood-tech startups attracted approximately half of all investments in Latin America (LATAM). There are currently around 300 startups in Brazil in the category of innovative ingredients and new food trends alone, EIT Food reported. “This number continues to grow significantly,” Benoit Buntinx, director of business creation at EIT Food, told Ingredients Network.

Development hub EIT Food, supported by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), has expanded its Food Accelerator Network programme to Brazil. “Brazil plays a leading role in the global production of agricultural commodities and related food products, as well as being a supplier to European markets,” Buntinx said.

The move opens up entrepreneurial opportunities for promising agrifood tech startups, marking its entry into the LATAM agrifood market. “Brazil has also demonstrated its ability to solve local and global problems in the agrifood sector through technological innovation and the rapid development of its startup ecosystem,” Buntinx added. The Brazilian programme will focus on food bioprocessing, next-generation plant-sourced solutions, and sustainable food packaging.

“In the last two years, the growth of ingredient startups has increased considerably, whether they’re plant-based, fermentation-based, or cultivated meat startups,” Guilherme Oliveira, corporate engagement specialist at The Good Food Institute (GFI) Brazil, told Ingredients Network. “We currently have around ten new startups developing innovative technologies to serve the sector, not to mention the large industries preparing and investing in new products,” Oliveira added.

New product development flourishes

“The development of new ingredients has been one of the main strategies for accelerating the sector’s growth and further improving the nutritional characteristics and properties of the products on the market,” Oliveira added. Developing products that are more accessible in terms of price and deliver a better experience for flexitarian consumers is also critical.

Healthy nutrition and developing new ingredients, such as encapsulated omegas from the startup Weecaps or upcycled ingredients developed by the Up&Zymes platform using precision fermentation and synthetic biology, are examples of leading names in the Brazilian startup food ingredient space.

“Brazil has enormous potential in the diversification of protein sources,” Paulo Silveira, founder and CEO at FoodTech Hub LATAM, told Ingredients Network. Among these are startup Hakkuna, which produces new offerings with insect proteins, and Typcal, the first Brazilian startup to produce protein from mycoproteins and the mycelium biomass fermentation process, which has the prospect of putting its ingredient on the market soon. Tekohá Foods is also working with biomass fermentation to develop and release new products.

“Some Brazilian ingredient companies have already publicly announced that they have included Brazilian species, such as beans, in their ingredient portfolio or are developing research at an advanced stage,” said Oliveira. Avante Food Systems, SL Alimentos and startups such as Bean Possible are among these. Startups Future Cow, Pas Biotech, and Updairy produce ingredients for the dairy industry using precision fermentation processes.

Case study: Cellva Ingredients

Cell culture company Cellva Ingredients is the first Brazilian company to develop and make animal ingredients using cell cultures, holding its first tasting event in July 2023. “In Brazil, the understanding and use of cell cultures is gaining traction as awareness of environmental and ethical issues in traditional food production grows,” said Sergio Pinto, CEO. Cellva joined ProVeg Inclubator’s 11th Cohort in September 2023, a business accelerator specialising in plant-based, fermentation and cultivated food startups.

Cellva’s process for producing cultivated pork fat involves isolating and developing animal cells in a controlled environment. “Through careful nutrient supply and combining food and biotech engineering techniques, we replicate the natural growth process of pork fat without raising and slaughtering animals,” said Pinto.

“The country’s rich agricultural landscape provides an opportunity to embrace sustainable practices,” he told Ingredients Network.

Backing Brazil’s biome

After teaming up with FoodTech Hub Brazil in 2020, GFI launched the Biomes programme in 2021. Through funding, the programme aims to encourage developing research involving native species of plant extraction to obtain ingredients that can be applied to plant-based products to make them appetising, nutritious, accessible and sustainable.

“It is essential to highlight Brazil’s massive potential for developing this type of ingredient, as we have the most incredible diversity of biomes globally,” said Oliveira. There are six biomes: the Amazon, Pantanal, Cerrado, Caatinga, Pampa and Atlantic Forest, with more than 46,000 plant species catalogued.

“Even today, many of the ingredients used in Brazilian products are imported, and their acquisition cost is high, which makes the products more expensive and less accessible,” Oliveira shared.

Infrastructure holds the industry back

“What is holding back the innovation scenario in Brazil is the need for more infrastructure,” said Oliveira. The country needs infrastructure such as pilot plants to validate new technologies on a large scale before taking them to market, especially for new technologies such as fermentation and cultivated meat. “However, the sector has organised itself and is starting discussions to think about and create ways to make these infrastructures viable shortly,” Oliveira noted.