Vegan food could expand faster - new report

Te Whanganui-a-Tara - New research suggests the plant-based meat market will grow significantly faster than the conventional meat sector in coming years.

MarketsandMarkets, which claims to be the world’s largest revenue impact company, published a new market report.

It estimates that the global plant-based meat market had a value of $US4.3 billion in 2020. Now, it projects the sector will skyrocket by around 93 percent to $US8.3 billion by 2025. The figures are significant given the projected growth of the animal meat market.

The conventional meat sector is currently worth considerably more – although, the figures are hazy, with valuations ranging from $US90 billion to more than $US740 billion.

But the market doesn’t seem to be moving as rapidly as the alternative protein industry.

One report predicts the global meat market will advance at a CAGR of 3.7 percent from 2021-2025 – a CAGR that is around 10 percent lower than its meat-free counterpart.

The estimations are based, in part, on each sector’s movements over the last few years.

A report from earlier this year looked at the trajectory of both plant- and animal-based meat markets from 2019-2020.

It uncovered that the US vegan meat category grew twice as quickly as conventional meat in 2020 – lunging forward by 45 percent.

In 2020, the plant-based meat market in the US grew quicker than animal meat.

But it wasn’t just vegan meat stealing the limelight; the plant-based dairy category expanded by 24 percent, while the vegan egg category grew by a whopping 168 percent.

And more broadly, the US’ entire vegan food market shot up by 27 percent. This is nearly twice as much as the US’ total retail food market, which expanded by 15 percent.

Further, according to a Bloomberg Intelligence report published in August, the animal-free food space won’t be slowing down anytime soon.

The company’s report estimates that the plant-based food market will exceed $162 billion within the next decade.

According to the most recent report, by MarketsandMarkets, the plant-based meat market’s significant growth is the result of a surge of people going vegan and flexitarian. The latter is the term coined for those who predominantly eat plant-based, but still consume some animal products.

A deepening understanding of the health implications of meat consumption, as well as the benefits of plant-based food, is driving the movement, the company says.

That’s in addition to an increase in government initiatives as well as massive investments in the plant-based sphere.

Separate data suggests animal welfare and sustainability concerns are also motivating people to ditch animal products.