Substitution of environmentally high-impacting meat with more sustainable
alternatives is becoming not only necessary, but also popular through vegetarian,
vegan and flexitarian diets. Numerous food products are under recent development
to cover the requirement of consumers in more environmentally sustainable and yet
nutritionally beneficial food analogs. Several scientific studies indicated that meat
substitutes had a lower environmental impact than meat [8–17]. Even though the
environmental benefits of texturized plant protein substitutes (soybean, pea, lupine,
etc.) are well-known and proven [18, 19], their nutritional and organoleptic qualities
require improvement [20, 21]. Other analogs based on milk, mycoproteins, insects,
microalgae, etc., are not environmentally beneficial in all of the cases [5, 6, 22, 23],
but have improved nutritional profile, more similar to animal derived products
[23–26]. Developments in cellular agriculture claim that creation of meat, milk,
cheese and eggs without agricultural inputs is more environmentally friendly due to
the avoidance of agricultural stage [7, 27]. Despite the complete nutritional identity
between cellular products and animal derived foods, the environmental impacts of
cultured food are usually higher due to low Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) and
increased use of energy as well as biotechnological raw materials [5, 7, 28].
Although, few comparative studies of environmental performance and nutritional
value of meat substitutes to animal derived products were published [5, 10, 15], the
analyses did not cover complete variety of food analogs and production technologies. Even though further environmental optimization measures for food substitutes
are known, they are rarely analyzed and reported in literature. Upscaling of production, reduction of energy consumption, reduction of waste amounts and utilization of waste streams as raw materials are among the most known measures,
which should be analyzed to identify future potential of food substitutes. Therefore,
it is necessary to perform a holistic systematization of more sustainable production
potential for “food of the future” based on innovative and emerging technologies of
alternative protein products supply. Such systematization should provide an answer
on more sustainable ways to produce food substitutes with existing industrial
infrastructure and the potential of improvement with the use of agri-food waste.
2 Methods and Materials
The study included two main stages. First, it relied on a systematic review of research
literature addressing the production of food substitutes and their associated environmental impacts. It was complied with own results on the LCA of food substitutes.
Further, the authors assessed the technological potential of agri-food waste application for the design of food substitutes. This way, the first part of the study indicated
the most promising options of food substitute’s production from environmental
perspective, while the second part estimated further potential for environmental
impact improvement. The second part resulted in generalized comparison model
(matrix) used for the assessment of environmental impact of food production scenarios with application of waste streams as a main source of raw materials.
146
S. Smetana et al.
alternatives is becoming not only necessary, but also popular through vegetarian,
vegan and flexitarian diets. Numerous food products are under recent development
to cover the requirement of consumers in more environmentally sustainable and yet
nutritionally beneficial food analogs. Several scientific studies indicated that meat
substitutes had a lower environmental impact than meat [8–17]. Even though the
environmental benefits of texturized plant protein substitutes (soybean, pea, lupine,
etc.) are well-known and proven [18, 19], their nutritional and organoleptic qualities
require improvement [20, 21]. Other analogs based on milk, mycoproteins, insects,
microalgae, etc., are not environmentally beneficial in all of the cases [5, 6, 22, 23],
but have improved nutritional profile, more similar to animal derived products
[23–26]. Developments in cellular agriculture claim that creation of meat, milk,
cheese and eggs without agricultural inputs is more environmentally friendly due to
the avoidance of agricultural stage [7, 27]. Despite the complete nutritional identity
between cellular products and animal derived foods, the environmental impacts of
cultured food are usually higher due to low Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) and
increased use of energy as well as biotechnological raw materials [5, 7, 28].
Although, few comparative studies of environmental performance and nutritional
value of meat substitutes to animal derived products were published [5, 10, 15], the
analyses did not cover complete variety of food analogs and production technologies. Even though further environmental optimization measures for food substitutes
are known, they are rarely analyzed and reported in literature. Upscaling of production, reduction of energy consumption, reduction of waste amounts and utilization of waste streams as raw materials are among the most known measures,
which should be analyzed to identify future potential of food substitutes. Therefore,
it is necessary to perform a holistic systematization of more sustainable production
potential for “food of the future” based on innovative and emerging technologies of
alternative protein products supply. Such systematization should provide an answer
on more sustainable ways to produce food substitutes with existing industrial
infrastructure and the potential of improvement with the use of agri-food waste.
2 Methods and Materials
The study included two main stages. First, it relied on a systematic review of research
literature addressing the production of food substitutes and their associated environmental impacts. It was complied with own results on the LCA of food substitutes.
Further, the authors assessed the technological potential of agri-food waste application for the design of food substitutes. This way, the first part of the study indicated
the most promising options of food substitute’s production from environmental
perspective, while the second part estimated further potential for environmental
impact improvement. The second part resulted in generalized comparison model
(matrix) used for the assessment of environmental impact of food production scenarios with application of waste streams as a main source of raw materials.
146
S. Smetana et al.