PLANT BASED DAIRY ALTERNATIVES 2022
What does this mean for manufacturers? Fortunately,
there are many possible ways. At Fi Europe this year,
plant-based will again be one of the key topics, with many
exhibitors and speakers offering solutions for nutritional
enhancement of all sorts of products. Attendees will find
the perfect platform for exploring the latest developments
and innovative ingredients and solutions available
to help meet the expectations of consumers and nutritionists
for this increasingly important category.
Clean label, clean communication
Amidst the vast array of possibilities in the dairy and
dairy alternative fields, naturalness and a clean label
are still key for consumers.
While milk drink alternatives are usually only minimally
processed, this is not the case for many other categories,
such as plant-based cheeses and yogurts. To achieve
the desired mouthfeel and spreadability in these products,
their ingredients lists tend to be much longer, plus
they often require intensive processing.
The challenge for product developers in the future will
be to find clean label ingredients and use gentle production
processes that deliver desirable product properties
and a favourable nutritional profile at the same
time, and to offer dairy alternatives also for price sensitive
consumers: Current alternative bases such as
VEGAN CHEESE ALTERNATIVE
Violife produces less carbon emissions
16 · September/October 2022 ¦ international-dairy.com
fermented nuts can be much higher in price, meaning
that many finished products carry premium price tags.
Interesting alternatives in the future could be milk protein
obtained by using microbial fermentation, precision
engineering and cell cultivation, once they received novel
food approval in all regions.
Communication remains a sensitive subject too: For
manufacturers, it is important to build trust through
honest and clear marketing. As numerous examples
have shown in the past, consumers and consumer associations
react harshly to misleading messages and
greenwashing. Transparency and honest communication
definitely pay off and create trust in everyone’s
eyes.
At Fi Europe this year, a number of speakers will explore
key topics in the dairy and plant-based alternatives
segment, and share their expertise with the audience.
The Fi Global Insights Dairy and Dairy Alternatives Report
is available online here:
https://www.figlobal.com
https://bit.ly/figidairy
Greek Vegan brand Violife claims that its vegan
cheese has 50 percent of the climate impact
of real cheese. The brand worked with leading
sustainability advisor Quantis to calculate the
climate footprint of eight Violife vegan cheese
products through their entire life cycle. The assessment
took into account the growing of the
natural ingredients used in the products’ recipes,
and it considered all the steps involved in
making the products, including transportation,
production, packaging, distribution, and their
disposal by consumers.
In addition to producing less than half the carbon
footprint, the study revealed Violife cheeses
occupy less than one-third of the land when
compared to the same amount of dairy cheese.
Violife undertook the assessment to highlight
the importance of making the switch from dairy
to dairy-free products, and the impact consumer
choices have on the environment.
As a result of these findings, Violife has launched
a new "Change" campaign, that welcomes consumers
to a world where simply changing dairy
cheese to a vegan alternative can reduce one’s
environmental impact.
Based in Thessalonica, Greece since the 1990s,
Violife’s products are available in more than 50
countries around the world
(photo: Violife)
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