News with regards to Foodleap 

December 14, 2022

News with regards to Foodleap

Hi my name is Guido Laman. I work as strategy lead at Foodvalley and as a project leader of Foodleap. As partners with community benefits you have access to an experimental version of Foodleap since May 2022. Now we are looking forward to present you an updated 2.0 version of Foodleap.

Foodleap what’s that again?

Till now Foodleap mainly functioned as a place for community partners to exchange information and ideas. However, the platform will have a far broader function in the future.
Foodleap is an online network that offers you the possibility to find and interact with interesting partners. By just entering your needs, Foodleap will present available contact persons, specified on for example a specific topic, region, technology, or type of actor. However, the platform is not only a search engine, but also a lively platform to ask questions and share your ideas. It gives you a great opportunity to discuss earlier findings or reach out to contacts within the Foodleap network. Your most relevant partners are only a few clicks away.

What will you notice?

In the past year we developed the following:

  • We updated the user interface to be more user friendly. We scraped a lot of clutter in the interface to make sure you can find key functions.
  • We updated 150 organisational and shared facility profiles to make sure the search engine and taxonomy behind it works properly. This has been a monumental task that we will continue to be doing in the next months. You will still be able to check, update or improve the profiles of your organisation yourselves but we as Foodvalley wanted to provide you the service of doing most of ground. When you still miss organisations. Please let us know via get help button ‘?’ on Foodleap or via your community manager. We will try to add them on the platform and approach them to join
    Foodleap.
  • We removed the community message board on the short term, so we only have the general message board. We did this to make sure you don’t have to ask your question on four different message boards. When the main message board starts to get cluttered, we can add more specific message boards if necessary.
  • It might be the case that you have to login / register again on the homepage of Foodleap when you are following a link towards a specific page. Please do so, to get directed to the right information .

What next?

  • We will do some internal user testing during December and January to make sure everything works properly.
  • When we are satisfied about the product. We will start to onboard more users on Foodleap so you we can broaden you search range. During
    is time we will constantly validate the user experience and do bug fixing to give you the best possible experience.
  • When this pilot phase is successful, we will start to add additional features. The sky is the limit, but we will get back to you on that.

Questions?

Please send an e-mail to info@foodleap.nl if you need support with registration or if you have another practical question. Please contact your Community Manager if you have specific questions about information regarding the Community and / or contact that you would like to be facilitated in.

Online New Year meeting and kick off 2023 on January 11 from 16.00 – 17.30 CET

December 14, 2022

Online New Year meeting TPC

Dear partner,

We would like to invite you to join our online New Year meeting and kick off 2023 together. During this meeting, we will look back at ’22 and give an overview of our events and projects in 2023. You will also meet some new partners of The Protein Community.
The meeting will take place online on January 11 from 16.00 – 17.30 CET.

Programme

  • Welcome & virtual toast to the New Year
  • Looking back at 2022: 5 years of TPC
  • Meet 3 new TPC-partners
    • Sjakes, Dylan Pels
      Mycobites (Chili),
    • Juan Enrique Bernstein
    • Lickin Company, Edwin van der Voort
  • Presentation/overview TPC looking forward:
    • Way of working + New colleagues: Eva Berends & Sylvia Raijmakers
    • Meetings Q1 & Q2 2023
    • Projects/initiatives from the Protein Transition, Jeroen Willemsen
    • German program, presented by Jochem Wolthuis (Oost NL)
  • Meet 3 other new TPC partners
    • To be announced
  • Breakout-sessions with new partners
  • Closing

Registration

TPC-partners can register via the personal invitation or via Foodleap.

If you are not a TPC-partners, please send a message to leo.koning@foodvalley.nl

Happy holidays & see you next year!

Warm regards,
Leo Koning
Community manager

Willem Paulus, new member of the TPC steering committee

December 13, 2022

Willem Paulus, new member of the TPC steering committee

We are happy to introduce Willem Paulus as our new member of the TPC steering committee. He will replace Jans Hoekman in January 2023, who was active in the steering committee since TPC started in 2017. Many thanks to Jans for his commitment and great ideas. You really helped our partners in the community and other stakeholders to make a big impact with the Protein Transition.

About Willem Paulus

My name is Willem Paulus and I started working at Oost NL since April 1 2022 as a Business Developer for the ‘Perspectief Fonds Gelderland’. This fund focuses on investing in accelerating and strengthening the innovative power of companies that deal with major social challenges such as energy transition, climate adaptation, circular economy, biodiversity, accessibility, and the living environment. Both social and economic returns are important in the investments we make.

Given my background, my focus within the fund is mainly on the agri-food sector. After my studies in Wageningen, I have lived and worked in various countries for the past 10 years, including Uganda, Ethiopia, Nepal, and Ghana. In these countries I have mainly been involved in making ambitious plans in the agri-food sector financeable. Often in public-private combinations of the Dutch business community (e.g. Bavaria, Maas International, Tony’s Chocolonely) and local governments or social institutions.

Oost NL strongly believes in the importance of the protein transition. It is for that reason that we are currently discovering several investment opportunities within this area. I look forward to representing Oost NL in The Protein Community and helping entrepreneurs with their ambitions in the transition.

Plant based meat grows on the farm

December 12, 2022

Plant based meat grows on the farm

In a meeting with the Fabulous Farm, one of the 120 TPC-partners, Marc van Lierop mentioned a project to inform schoolchildren in Spain about their products. To share their experience, I asked Marc some questions to explain more about this wonderful project.

What is the name of the project and what is included?

The name of the project is “Hamburgers are growing at the Farm!”. It is a kit that we developed for primary schools. Each kit contains one fable book, for the teachers to read out loud, soy seeds, placemats and an activity book for each kid, with puzzles, riddles, a colouring page, a guide how to grow their soy seeds and a recipe to prepare their own vegan burger.

How did you come up with this idea?

Unlike in Holland, children in Spain have their warm lunch at school. Meat and Fish are standard elements of their meals and vegan lunches are rare. In addition, children are very pure, they like something or they find disgusting, but in any case they stay away from the sometimes hard political debate that is being conducted everywhere in Spain (after all Spain is the country with the most meat consumption per capita in Europe). Our idea is to introduce them in a natural and playful way that a plant-based piece of meat can be very tasty.

When is it available, for who and where?

We will roll out the activity and supply the schookits from January onwards on primary schools in Barcelona and surroundings.

Did you develop this by yourself, or did you get help/funding or…?

All material was developed in house with the help of a befriended illustrator who regularly makes drawings for our brand communication.

What is the desired outcome?

Our expectations are high and we hope that we can soon introduce our kits and Ana and her friends (the main characters), to more schools and in other parts of Spain as well. One thing is certain, children will always have a role in our activities, so given our growth, we expect that we will soon have to translate the material and the fable into other languages as well. We would be happy to do so, because after all, we are Fabulous!

For more info, please email to Marc van Lierop:

E-mail Marc

Protein transition in Gelderland: above average activity and economic impact

November 22, 2022

Protein transition in Gelderland: above average activity and economic impact

Over the past five years, activity in The Province of Gelderland (the Netherlands) surrounding the protein transition has grown above average. This is evident from a monitor developed by The Protein Community and the province of Gelderland. The monitor ultimately aims to provide insight into the economic impact of the protein transition on a national scale.

Protein transition: sustainable industry in development

The Protein Transition – restoring the balance in the production and consumption of (less) animal and (more) vegetable protein – is high on the government’s agenda because of its value for climate, careful use of raw materials and health. Underlying this is a developing industry that aims to make sustainable protein ingredients, products and technologies available to consumers and industry. Little is known about the current and future economic value of this industry. The recently celebrated 5th anniversary of The Protein Community (TPC) – founded in 2017 by Foodvalley NL, the provinces of Gelderland, Overijssel and East NL – has been used to gain more insight into this.

Above average growth Gelderland

As a pilot, the developments in employment, the number of companies and the economic value for Gelderland were mapped out. This is based on the TPC-database with Dutch companies active in the protein transition, as well as the results of the annual Provincial Employment Survey (PWE). The results show above-average growth: the number of jobs at the identified group of 66 companies grew in Gelderland from 1,730 in 2017 to 1,920 in 2021, a growth of 11.2%. 29 of these plant based protein companies are partner of The Protein Community. By way of comparison: in the province, the development of all sectors was 6.9% in the period. It is also striking that the added value of the protein companies is well above 100 million euros. The total number of companies active in this sector in Gelderland has increased by 70% in the past 5 years to 75 companies in 2021.

Helga Witjes, deputy of the province of Gelderland for Economy, responds enthusiastically: “We are focusing on the theme of protein transition for 5 years. It is great to see that the efforts are also translating into positive economic effects.”

Marjolein Brasz, director of Foodvalley NL, calls for the monitoring tool to be further developed and widely deployed: ‘The method combines existing databases and surveys and offers the opportunity to also provide insight into the socio-economic effects of the protein transition. This is necessary to gain broad support. The monitor also provides wonderful insight into the opportunities that the protein transition offers, in the Netherlands and beyond.

Meet The Protein Community & partners on FFF Expo

November 18, 2022

Meet The Protein Community & partners on FFF Expo

On 22&23 November 2022, The Protein Community will attend The Free From Food Expo in RAI Amsterdam.

Together with partners Biobite, GreenFood50, Lekker Lupine and Phycom we will present the Big 5! Vegaburger with local ingredients from The Netherlands.

You can taste this delicious Burger on our booth F17 and talk with the partners and with The Protein Community, powered by Foodvalley NL

On 22 November on 12.30 p.m., Leo Koning, Community manager of The Protein Community, will give his Keynote-presentation “Reduce time to market for Plant Based Protein Innovations”.

If you want to visit the FFF-expo for free

you can register here

Innogusto expands the range of attractive plant-based food concepts

October 31, 2022

Innogusto expands the range of attractive plant-based food concepts

Innogusto, a TPC-partner, has started Culivega. Culivega specializes in devising, developing and marketing 100% plant-based, traditional meal components for the food service sector and meal producers. Culivega consists of half Innogusto (Carola and Mattèo Piano) and half of Productief Holding BV (Richard van der Zande, CEO Elstar Catering). Carola and Mattèo can now concentrate on plant-based concept development (R&D and Branding) and on business development. Both the production and commercial activities related to the plant-based meal components of RESTOPIA® and RESTOPIA® Professional brands are transferred to Culivega. Henk van Beek, director of Culivega BV, is contact person for commercial matters. Henk has many years of experience in the ready-to-eat meals sector for the food service and can be reached via h.vanbeek@culivega.com

Need more information?

Go to the Culivega website

Brave New Food: startup challenge for alternative proteins

October 28, 2022

Brave New Food: startup challenge for alternative proteins

Brave New Food has launched a new challenge for food startups, with innovative solutions that help accelerate the transition to a healthier and more sustainable food system. This Startup Challenge focuses on next generation solutions in the domains of Healthier food solutions, Alternative proteins, Zero food waste and Sustainable packaging. These challenges connect promising startups and scale-ups to leading food and retail companies, investors and knowledge partners to help them accelerate and have more impact.

On the 1st of December 10 startups participating in the Startup Challenge 2022 will pitch their solutions live to leading food corporates and impact investors. One of the jury members is Marjolein Brasz, Managing Director at Foodvalley NL.

Need more information?

Go to the Challenge

Update from CO-FRESH: product innovations with Dutch grown Faba beans

October 27, 2022

Update from CO-FRESH: product innovations with Dutch grown Faba beans

In this EU-funded project about food sustainablity, 7 partners from TPC participate to speed up innovations with Faba beans from the Netherlands. The participants are Agriservice Lindenhols, Meelunie, Multiflour, MFH-Pulses, Ojay, Keygene, Codrico and knowledge partners Wageningen University and Louis Bolk Institute. Now we have entered the second phase of the project, where the partners have selected 2 innovations:
1) Create a mimic meat by means of minimal processing e.g. fermentation 2) Develop better product recognition and create a local brand to support innovation number 1). The coming months, workplans must be defined. Want to know more? Check the website or contact Leo Koning, pilot case leader.

Need more information?

Go to the CO-FRESH website