INDUSTRY TALK – PLANT-BASED ALTERNATIVES
Lucrative opportunities for plant-based food manufacturers Business owners and entrepreneurs are always on the lookout for new opportunities and, according to market sizing and consumer data from Europe, one potentially lucrative opportunity is vegan cheese explains Donovan Will, director of Proveg South Africa.
A
ccording to a market sizing report that
vegan cheese was at the top of the
looked at Nielsen market data from 11
list of products that plant-based
European countries for a period of two
consumers are looking for.
years ending September 2020, the plant-based
According to Verena Wiederkehr,
food economy in Europe grew by 49% with
former head of Food Industry and
plant-based-cheese purchases growing by a
Retail at ProVeg International, who
staggering 112%.
oversaw the research, “The data
Despite this growth, vegan cheese is still
supports the view that good quality,
one of the most sought after plant-based
affordable, plant-based cheeses have a
products in Europe. ProVeg International,
good chance of penetrating, capturing and
a food awareness organisation based in
retaining a large part of this fast-growing and
Berlin, recently conducted a large scale
lucrative sector.”
consumer survey across nine European
South Africans might think that we’re
countries in order to identify priorities for
immune to these global trends because
product improvement and development
we’re a nation of meat-lovers, but research
in the plant-based food market, and
shows that even in other meat-loving countries like Germany, the move away from meat
Donovan Will, Director of Proveg South Africa
large ranges, there are well over 100 meat replacement options in South Africa. On the plant-based milk replacement side,
is significant. Currently
there is a similar story. In 2020, the ProVeg
only 26% of Germans eat a
South Africa team tasted and catalogued
meat product every single
80 different plant-based milk alternatives
day, compared to 34%
that were available in South Africa, and more
in 2015. We are already
have been introduced since then.
seeing increased demand
While there are vegan cheese options
for plant-based alternative
available, like Violife’s range and Woolworths’s
products in South Africa
house brand range of vegan cheeses, the
- highlighted by Burger
options are few, especially when compared to
King South Africa’s recent
other plant-based alternatives like meat and
addition of a plant-based
milk replacements.
Whopper, Vegan Royale and
The opportunity for South African
vegan nuggets. There has
manufacturers is two-fold. Firstly, gaps have
been an explosion of plant-
been identified in the European market and
based meat alternatives
there’s good reason to think these export
on retailer’s shelves in
opportunities exist elsewhere.
recent years. Ten years ago
Additionally, there is an opportunity to be
the only quality option in
one of the first major players in some of these
this category would have
categories locally.
been the range from The
Along with plant-based cheese, other
Fry Family Food Co. and
opportunities in the plant-based segment
while Fry’s continues to
that were highlighted by the report
dominate this space locally,
include plant-based egg and plant-based
they have been joined
convenience meals. •
by at least 17 other meat replacement brands that are now available in retail stores in South Africa. As many of these brands have
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October 2021 | FOOD RE VIEW
The full ProVeg Consumer Survey Report can be downloaded here: https://proveg.com/what-we-do/ corporate-engagement/proveg-consumer-surveyreport-download/
