Bio-hacking our way into Nutrition Security? Take-aways from a week at San Francisco’s World Agri-Tech and Future Food Tech
Written by: Meghan O’Hearn, PhD - FSF Impact Director
Perusing through an exhibition hall of cultured chicken breasts, precision fermentation-enabled edible oils, smoothies made from powdered, pineapple and mango waste, and chocolate bars sweetened with prebiotic, upcycled oat hulls and corn cobs gave me the sense that I had landed in a science fiction conference. Some panelists called for a future of food with the mouthfeel and taste of Wagyu beef, the nutritional profile of salmon, and the carbon footprint of a one- room science laboratory – to meet consumers “where they are,” while addressing our world’s climate and health crises. Others discussed the manipulation of bioactive compounds within foods for targeted medical therapies in an effort to drive “food is medicine.” Investors buzzed with excitement about the latest innovations for our food future for a healthier people and planet, despite today’s tumultuous financial climate.
But not me. Beyond my visceral uneasiness about the bioengineered future of my dinner plate, I questioned whether these solutions would truly meet the majority of consumers where they are now – in a financial and socially debilitating health and nutrition security crisis.
Entrepreneurs and investors alike increasingly acknowledge the need for innovations that solve the greatest planetary and human health challenges. In reflecting on my experiences at World Agri-Tech and Future Food Tech, I came to the realization that while innovations addressing environmental sustainability challenges operate on a “macro”, systems scale, innovations for health are operating on the “micro”, individual scale. Currently, improving one’s health is the responsibility of the individual and disproportionately, those from the affluent echelons of society with money, access to, and awareness of a nutritious diet benefit the most from the latest food-tech and precision nutrition innovations. On the other hand, our climate challenges are considered a problem that demand a collective response. Which leads me to question, why are we addressing environmental sustainability at a systems level but leaving health and nutrition challenges for the individual to solve? The extent to which innovations were equitably addressing global health challenges was not on most attendees’ radars. I fear a negative consequence of the narrow customer base for food-tech innovations is increased health disparity and inequity in our already-fragmented food system.
Building the business case for food is health
A paradigm shift in innovation is required – one that embraces the centrality of food to wellness, equity, and disease prevention. I challenge more innovators and entrepreneurs to examine the most pressing global health burdens, particularly for those most vulnerable and marginalized, and design profitable business models to address and improve human health. Instead of biohacking our way to a marginally healthier product only available to the elite 1%, let us instead consider how to make nutritious foods more accessible and more affordable today. For example, how about designing technologies that work to eliminate supply chain inefficiencies from farm to fork, reduce wastage of fresh produce, better connect farmers to consumers, and incentivize the production, processing, distribution, sale, and consumption of nutritious foods?
In addition, agri-tech’s role in driving positive nutrition impacts is not well understood, endorsed, or cultivated by leading innovators and investors in this space. At World Agri-Tech, I observed exciting innovations in the agricultural landscape, capitalizing on AI-based technologies that bring automation, climate resilience, and data to farmers and support increased yields and improved livelihoods. The planetary health benefits of these products and services are increasingly acknowledged, marketed, and invested in. But not so with nutrition. These same technologies can also have lasting nutrition impacts for farmers and consumers alike, but the sector has not adequately developed the narrative around distal food system value chain implications on nutrition and health. Drawing these connections, educating on the linkages between agricultural production, livelihoods building, and public health, and growing the evidence base is crucial.
If we are going to fix our inequitable and unhealthy food system, we must start by democratizing access to innovation, building the storyline of food is health from farm to fork, incentivizing partnerships that span the value chain, and aligning business solutions towards measurable improvements in nutrition for all.
The power of metrics in guiding food systems innovation
A challenge in making this paradigm shift is knowing which innovations have the greatest impact on population nutrition. We need a common, quantitative definition of healthy foods, and we need to expand stakeholders’ understanding of the various drivers and contributors to nutrition beyond food itself (affordability, accessibility, awareness of healthy foods to name a few). A key enabler to make this shift is open-source, science-based metrics that quantify the impact businesses have on nutrition for all. Given the breadth of food system innovation that can address public health and nutrition, such a suite of metrics must be nimble to investment stage, business size, and placement in the food system value chain, and adequately capture the totality of business impacts on nutrition. These metrics must be packaged as practical tools for decision-making and coupled with nutrition technical assistance for businesses and investors alike to collect data and measure impacts consistently and accurately. These tools must be scrutinized and validated by scientists, piloted by start-ups, later stage companies, and investors, and socialized for widespread use alongside other ESG priorities. Such a toolkit is critical for streamlining how the private sector identifies, measures, manages, monitors, evaluates, communicates, and ultimately attracts more capital to support food is health innovations that result in measurable impacts on population nutrition.
At Food Systems for the Future, food is health is core to our vision, and we know we cannot make this paradigm shift alone. On a mission to end malnutrition for all, FSF is building the enabling ecosystem for scaling evidence-based investments in population nutrition and creating alliances to solve these complex, food systems problems together. We are developing science-based, pragmatic nutrition impact measurement and management (IMM) tools to quantitatively measure and practically report the nutrition impacts, with a focus on underserved and low-income communities. We are co-convening a dynamic Food Nutrition and Health Investor Coalition (FNHIC), which builds off the momentum around the 2022 White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health to accelerate financing and private sector accountability towards these national goals. We are working with this coalition and other allies to establish the global gold standard for nutrition IMM to collectively elevate accountability and accelerate capital towards nutrition impacts based on common definitions of impact. We are simultaneously advocating for a policy environment to support private sector’s role in driving nutrition security through nutrition-positive incentives across the food system business and investment value chains. Together, such actions will enable innovative, market-driven food and agriculture enterprises to sustainably, measurably, and profitably improve nutrition outcomes for underserved and low-income communities.
We will know we have made progress if innovations that address the public health crises of today feature in next year’s World Agri-Tech or Future Food Tech agenda. An ambitious workplan is ahead of us, but I’m optimistic we can (and must!) find traction in democratizing innovation for a healthier and more equitable food system.
Interested in joining FSF on this audacious journey? Email me at meghan@fsfinstitute.net to learn more.