Global pea protein sales amounted to $73.4 million in 2016, according to research firm Grand View Research, but are forecast to quadruple by 2025, reaching $313.5 million in sales, helped by popular diets free of gluten and lactose and an expanding middle class in developing nations.
Even with such explosive growth, pea proteins would have high potential upside because they would account for a fraction of the projected $48.77 billion global animal and plant protein ingredients market by 2025, which is led by meat, according to Grand View.
Powering Up The Pea
Cargill’s partnership with PURIS includes breeding pea crops for higher protein content. Standard peas contain 18 to 22 percent protein, but PURIS this year will start selling peas packed with 28 percent protein for planting by farmers in the northern Plains and Midwest, said PURIS president Tyler Lorenzen. Once processed, pea powders can contain about 80 percent protein.
Creating new varieties of protein-packed peas, however, can take seven years or more because it is done through conventional breeding rather than genetic modification, Lorenzen said. The lack of genetic modification, however, also attracts many consumers who prefer more organic foods, said Pascal Leroy, head of Roquette’s pea and new protein business line.
In Canada, one of the world’s biggest pea exporters, at least three pea protein plants are planned or increasing production, including Verdient Foods in Saskatchewan, whose investors include Titanic director James Cameron. That gives farmers an incentive to vary plantings that are now dominated by wheat and canola.
Roquette is building what it says will be the world’s biggest pea plant in Manitoba, on the belief the vegetable has unique consumer appeal. German company Canadian Protein Innovation plans a plant in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.
Illinois-based ADM told Reuters it is building a new pea protein processing plant at the site of one of its soybean processing complexes in Enderlin, North Dakota. The location gives the company proximity to yellow pea producers and transportation to domestic and international customers, according to ADM’s Campbell.
ADM will launch its line of pea powders as an ingredient for food manufacturers early next year and introduce other plant-based protein product lines in the following two years, the company said, declining to give further details.
Unlike Cargill, ADM is seeking to boost pea protein levels in the processing plant—rather than through crop breeding—and is buying most of its supplies from nearby North Dakota farmers, the company said. ADM officials declined to detail how it can boost protein in a factory, citing competitive concerns.
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