10/27/2023

The Future of Oilseeds: Prospects for Plant based Proteins

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Plant-based foods and alternative protein sources are playing an increasingly important role in sustainable nutrition. Against this background, the German Society for Fat Science (DGF) organised the symposium "The Future of Oilseeds: Prospects for Plant-based Proteins? The presentations revolved around the key question: How can high-quality proteins for food production be obtained from protein-containing oil plants and legumes, but also from exotic plants? 
Andreas Detzel, Managing Director, Scientific Director and Head of the Department of Industry and Products at ifeu in Heidelberg, gave the lecture "Sustainability Aspects of Protein Crops for Food Production". In his presentation, he demonstrated that foods made from plant proteins must be viewed in a very differentiated way.

Plant-based foods and alternative protein sources are playing an increasingly important role in sustainable nutrition. Many consumers worldwide are making a conscious decision to reduce their consumption of products of animal origin, especially meat and dairy products, or to meet their protein needs through plant-based or alternative sources. The food industry is responding accordingly by investing in the development of new recipes and products based on alternative protein sources. In 2022, companies in this country produced 6.5% more meat substitute products compared to the previous year, and production even increased by 72.7% compared to 2019, according to the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis).

Against this background, the German Society for Fat Science (DGF) organised the symposium "The Future of Oilseeds: Prospects for Plant-based Proteins?" (translated "The Future of Oilseeds: Prospects for Plant-based Proteins?"). The presentations revolved around the core question: How can high-quality proteins for food production be obtained from protein-containing oil plants (rapeseed, sunflower) and legumes (lupins, peas, beans), but also from exotic plants (such as macauba)?

The conference offered participating industrial companies and speakers from the oil-processing industry, research institutes and the food industry a platform to exchange knowledge and discuss the latest findings on protein sources, their production and possible applications for food. The event took place on 23 and 24 October in Frankfurt am Main.

Andreas Detzel, Managing Director, Scientific Director and Head of the Industry and Products Department at ifeu in Heidelberg, is investigating and evaluating plant-based and alternative protein sources as part of several ongoing projects. Together with various project partners, he is compiling sustainability profiles for protein ingredients from different protein sources. The aim is to map these in a protein database that is currently being developed within the BMBF-funded innovation space "New Food Systems". In his lecture "Sustainability Aspects of Protein Crops for Food Production", he used concrete calculations to demonstrate that foods made from plant proteins must be viewed in a very differentiated way: The more proteins are processed (see pdf pages 6 and 14), the less favourable their climate and environmental balance develops. However, as data availability for such process data is still relatively low, he recommended to increasingly develop supply chain-specific data in the future and to be cautious for the time being with the use of blanket data to show "carbon footprints" ("Umweltfußprprints") of decided products on the shop shelf.

Further information:

Presentation “Sustainability Aspects of Protein Crops for Food Production” (Andreas Detzel, Simon Früh) als pdf zum Download 

Symposium „The Future of Oilseeds: prospects for Plan based Proteins”