Morning Folks,

There’s a conversation I keep having lately: Donald Trump might turn out to be the best thing that ever happened to renewable energy and EVs. Not because he cares about climate, but because the Iran war has forced countries (particularly low and middle-income ones) around the world to confront a brutal truth: over-reliance on fossil fuels is a national security risk. When oil can be weaponised, when supply chains can be cut overnight, renewables and EVs stop being “green choices” and start being about energy independence, resilience and optionality.

It’s tempting to think the same thing will happen for sustainable protein: that some shock will force governments to wake up and treat protein security as a strategic imperative, something China is doing. In their new Five-Year Plan, Beijing talks of the importance of “new proteins” for food resilience and independence.

But I don’t think food will break open the same way energy did: we shouldn’t assume a parallel shock will produce a parallel policy response, because food is fundamentally different from energy and EVs in ways that matter.

First, energy has a relatively simple end-use: you need electricity or fuel to power your lights, factories, cars and homes. Renewable power and EVs are direct, drop-in replacements or upgrades to existing infrastructure. Food, by contrast, is not just a single commodity; it’s culture, identity, tradition, taste, ritual and social practice wrapped into something people do multiple times a day, every day. You can switch a country’s power mix without asking most people to change how they live their lives. You cannot switch the global protein mix without asking people to change what’s on their plate, how it tastes, how it feels in the mouth, and what their grandmothers used to cook.

Second, energy policy can be framed cleanly as “energy independence”: produce more at home, import less, reduce vulnerability. Food independence is messier. People care not just about having calories, but having their calories: beef in Argentina, pork in China, wheat and dairy in Europe, rice and fish across much of Asia. A “domestic protein” strategy that looks rational on a balance sheet can feel like an attack on national identity when it starts displacing beloved meats and dishes. That cultural friction doesn’t exist in the same way when you swap diesel for solar.

Third, the energy transition is driven by a relatively narrow set of actors: utilities, grid operators, carmakers, battery producers, oil companies, and a handful of governments and regulators. Food involves billions of consumers, millions of farmers and brands, reshaped by local tastes, religious rules, culinary traditions and deeply entrenched supply chains. You can centralise decisions about power generation and vehicle standards much more easily than you can centralise decisions about what billions of people choose to eat.

Finally, the economics of the energy transition are clearer and more binary. Either you produce renewable electricity or you don’t. There’s no single “sustainable protein” that can replace “oil” in a single policy move. The sector will likely evolve as a patchwork of niches, blends, incremental reforms and some breakthrough categories, not as a clean, sudden pivot.

So no, I don’t think we’ll see a moment where governments suddenly treat sustainable protein the same way they now treat renewables and EVs, even after a major shock. We might see more attention, more pilots, more procurement rules, more funding for biotech and some food-security framing. But it won’t be the same kind of high-stakes, national-security-driven industrial policy. Food is too personal, too cultural, too fragmented, and too tied to identity for that kind of clean, top-down pivot to happen.

The lesson for the sector is to stop waiting for an AHA moment and start playing the hand we actually have: build resilience and optionality where it matters most (strategic proteins for hospitals, campuses, military, emergency response), design for taste and convenience rather than purity, and frame sustainability in terms of health, cost, supply-chain security and local jobs—not just climate. China is already moving in that direction. The West needs to stop assuming food will follow energy’s path and start building a future-food strategy that actually fits how food works.

-Sonalie

💡 Only On Green Queen

🫗 Opinion: Oatly Lost the Word ‘Milk’ – Is ‘Leather’ Next?
Stephanie Downs, co-founder and CEO of sustainable leather startup Uncaged Innovations, reflects on how the plant-based milk labelling debate could be echoed in the materials industry.

📲 abillion CEO on What Went Wrong & What’s Next for the Vegan Discovery Platform
Vikas Garg, founder and CEO of Abillion, explains why the platform was forced to shut down, and reveals it’s in discussions with “investors and other parties” to explore a future for the business.

 Must-Read Headlines

🦆 Parima Gets Approval to Sell Cultivated Duck Under Gourmey Brand in Singapore
French cultivated meat pioneer Parima, the parent company of Gourmey and Vital Meat, has obtained regulatory clearance to sell its cultivated duck in Singapore, its second such approval in six months.

🐟 Bluu Reaches Industrial Production of Cultivated Fish Cells for Personal Care & Seafood
German startup Bluu has scaled up production of its cultivated fish cells to 1,000-litre bioreactors in partnership with Dutch firm Cultivate at Scale, with the personal care sector its first target.

🥩 Molecular Farming Pioneer Moolec Science Produces Iron-Rich Beef Protein in Pea Seeds
Moolec Science has achieved a breakthrough in its molecular farming tech, genetically engineering pea seeds to produce bovine myoglobin, a heme-containing protein.

📈 North America Defies Global Decline in Alternative Protein Jobs in 2025
Employment opportunities in the future food sector declined in 2025 amid shifting investment priorities and business models, though North America bucked the trend.

💰 Funding News

🥔 With New Round, Finally Foods Hits $2.6M in Funding to Grow Dairy Proteins in Potatoes with AI
Molecular farming startup Finally Foods has closed a pre-seed funding round, bringing its total raised to $2.6M, with another $4-6M targeted to expand production of its casein-containing potatoes.

🌱 Beyond Substitution, Everyday Products Drive 5% Growth of Europe’s Plant-Based Market
Europe’s plant-based food market grew by 5% from 2024-25, reaching €16.3B in value as several products outpaced animal proteins – but it still makes up a fraction of the region’s food and drink sales, according to new Circana research. 

🇬🇧 Clean Food Group Nets $7M in Funding to Become World’s Largest Yeast Oil Manufacturer
Clean Food Group has raised £4.5M ($6.1M) in new funding, alongside a £700,000 ($950,000) grant from the UK government, to expand production of its sustainable yeast-derived fats.

🤝🏽 Plant-Based Company Updates

🫛 UK’s Fastest-Growing Plant-Based Dairy Brand Enters the Protein Powder World
Carlsberg Britvic-owned Plenish has expanded its clean-label plant-based portfolio with two pea protein powders, tapping into the UK’s growing protein market.

🏀 Impossible Foods Partners with Madison Square Garden, New York Knicks & RangersUK’s Fastest-Growing Plant-Based Dairy Brand Enters the Protein Powder World
Madison Square Garden, the New York Knicks and the New York Rangers have made Impossible Foods their official plant-based burger partner, with the brand opening a new concession stand at the arena.

🥚 Beyond Meat Revamps Breakfast Sausage Line With Less Protein & Much Lower Saturated Fat
Beyond Meat has reformulated its breakfast sausage lineup with avocado oil, cutting saturated fat content by 89% and, in some cases, protein by 36%.

📖 Latest Research

🥛 Why Hybrid Dairy is Outperforming Plant-Based Formats in Taste Tests
Products that blend dairy with plant-based ingredients are preferred over 100% vegan formats in taste tests, but these ‘balanced proteins’ lag in purchase intention. Here’s how they can close the gap.

🥓 Swapping Processed Meat with Plant-Based Alternatives Boosts Health, Show Two Studies
Replacing processed meat with plant-based analogues – even if they’re ultra-processed – has been found to increase fibre and reduce saturated fat intake in two new UK studies.

🛒 Blended Proteins 4% Cheaper Than Meat As Supermarkets Drive Category in the Netherlands
Private-label products make up the majority of blended protein launches in the Netherlands, which are 4.4% cheaper on average than meat and dairy, according to a new analysis.

🌍 Policy & Regulation

🦠 EU Asked to Include Microbial Proteins & Fermentation in Upcoming Biotech Act
The EU should name fermentation-derived food ingredients as a covered technology category and boost investment for scale-up in its second Biotech Act, due later this year, according to a new policy brief.

🩺 RFK Jr Asks Hospitals to Prioritise Non-UPF Proteins, Including Plant-Based Options
US health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr has directed hospitals to align their food purchases with the dietary recommendations or risk losing funding – but unlike the guidelines, the fine print is in favour of plant-based proteins.

🚀 Everything Else In Future Food

🇯🇵 Japan’s Kanematsu Taps 2nd Nature’s AI Tech to Upcycle Ag Waste Into Functional Foods
Japanese trading giant Kanematsu Corporation has teamed up with US startup 2nd Nature to use AI to explore the potential of its agricultural sidestreams as sources of high-value functional ingredients.

🧴 Äio’s Yeast-Derived Fat Enters the Cosmetics Market with Tilk’s Skin-Boosting Serum
Estonian startup Äio has debuted its upcycled, sustainable fat alternative, RedOil, in a skin-boosting serum created with personal care brand Tilk.

🪸 Checkerspot Unveils Microalgae-Based Alternative to Intensively Farmed Oils in Personal Care
US startup Checkerspot has launched a fermentation-derived algal oil for personal care and cosmetics applications, as part of a collaboration with La Fabrique Végétale.

🌱🍔  Future Food Quick Bites 

In our weekly column, Future Food Quick Bites, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers cultivated pet food's Singapore debut, Khloe Kardashian's new plant protein chips, and a host of dairy-free brand campaigns.

📆 Scene & Heard

🇩🇰 Join Sonalie at the Bridge2Food Europe 2026

📣 Green Queen’s founder and editor-in-chief Sonalie Figueiras will be speaking at Bridge2Food Europe 2026, happening 9-11 June 2026 in Copenhagen, where she will give a keynote titled “The Global Politicization of Food and the Influence on Consumer Choices”. Catch her live to unpack how geopolitics and consumer behavior are increasingly intertwined in the future of food. Register to attend here.

🚀The Kickstarting for Good Incubator by ProVeg is an 18-week, Berlin-based program designed specifically for social-impact entrepreneurs, non-profits, and mission-driven organizations focused on transforming the global food system toward a plant-forward future. As the world's first program of its kind, it offers a hybrid structure of virtual and in-person sessions, pairing participants with high-caliber mentors to develop impactful initiatives in areas such as animal advocacy and alternative proteins. Apply here by 31 May 2026.

🍴Calling food entrepreneurs in the UK: global innovation platform The DO, which partners with companies, entrepreneurs, and changemakers to design programs tackling real-world challenges, from entrepreneurship fellowships and leadership journeys to collaborative innovation sprints is hosting a 2-day food innovation sprint in London on 5-6 May 2026, bringing together selected food entrepreneurs and innovators from a Fortune 500 FMCG company to co-create the next generation of snack concepts. Get involved by emailing [email protected].

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