Minneapolis, United States, May 31 - June 1, 2023

The two-day conference brought together leading stakeholders from across the food value chain, as well as government and NGOs, to address the pressing challenges of the supply chain transformations necessary to improve all aspects of the food and beverage industry. dsm-firmenich were proud sponsors of this important conference, alongside leading industry academic and other stakeholders.

Speaking on the panel “Can animal agriculture at scale be environmentally sustainable?” with other leaders in the industry, including senior representatives of YUM! Brands and the US Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, David Dayhoff, Sustainability Director - Precision Services, Animal Nutrition & Health, North America, dsm-firmenich stated, “Critically, we now see that the value chain is beginning to prioritize significantly improving the environmental impact of animal protein production in order to feed a growing population within planetary boundaries. My main message was clear and simple, that in addition to providing incentives and know-how for practice changes that improve sustainability, simultaneously we also must invest in credible measurement tools to document and share improvements. This is exactly why dsm-firmenich developed Sustell™ - to accurately measure and improve the environmental footprint of animal protein production and we are partnering with across the industry in doing just this – scaling up sustainable protein production already.”

One of the key learnings shared by many of the attendees was that when it comes to food, most of the footprints are on the farm side, so that´s where we should focus our efforts. Moreover, working at farm level to generate, collect and process the necessary data would allow the processors, retailers and food service to calculate, report and, working with the farmers, improve the environmental footprint of food. Several cases and pilots were presented where that is already happening or about to happen. The challenge now is to replicate and take them to scale.